Pesticides

“Pesticides are important.” Pesticides and natural crop resistance to herbicides are what let farmers make more food every year without buying more land. “Production of major crops has more than tripled since 1960, thanks in large part to pesticides. For example, rice – which feeds almost half the people on our planet – has more than doubled in production. The amount of wheat has increased nearly 160 percent.” Pesticides are very crucial to the production of crops because without them, over half of the crops that are made now, would be lost to weeds, and bugs. “Food crops must compete with 30,000 species of weeds, 3,000 species of worms, and 10,000 species of plant-eating insects.” An American study showed that between 50-90% of most fruits and vegetables would be lost without the use of pesticides (Croplife).

The Clinton Administration came up with ideas on adjusting some of the long term policies that controlled the use of some synthetic chemical pesticides. They are trying to get farmers to stop using so many synthetic chemical pesticides, and use a more natural way of pest control. This is a bad idea because there would be troubles with getting the scientific research needed, and the money needed for the research, and “According to a Texas A&M University study, U.S. crop yields would decline significantly if U.S. farmers substituted currently available nonchemical methods for synthetic chemicals. Soybean production, for example, would decrease 37%, wheat 24%, cotton 39%, rice 57%, peanuts 78%, and field corn 32%.” Also, by using synthetic pesticides, you can spray them, and get rid of many different nuisances. Using non-chemical pesticides are usually aimed at a single species of bug, plant, weed, etc. “In the United States, thousands of pest species infest 80 to 100 crops in many different regions. Thus, there are hundreds of thousands of possible combinations of pest, crop, and region that researchers could target to replace a particular use of one of the roughly 200 active pesticide ingredients now in use. The research agenda is cluttered with hundreds of such projects that share the amorphous goal of reducing the use of some pesticide. Yet only a fraction of pesticide uses appear to threaten human or environmental health” (Gianessi).

If the world switched to organic farming, it would not be very good. Tons of people would die because organic crop harvests don’t produce as much food most of the time compared to the usual farming. This means that to make some sort of profit, the organic farmers need to increase the price. "We aren't going to feed 6 billion people with organic fertilizer, the greatest catastrophe that the human race could face this century is not global warming but a global conversion to 'organic farming' - an estimated 2 billion people would perish.” Norman Borlaug said this at a 2002 conference. Since then, the population has gone up to roughly 7.9 billion people. That means that now, 2.6 billion people wouldn’t survive because of low crop yields, and raised crop prices. “Looking at more than 200 studies in North America and Europe, Per Pinstrup Andersen (a Cornell professor and winner of the World Food Prize) and colleagues recently concluded that organic yields were about 80 percent of conventional yields.” 80% is a lot of could-be crops. If you were to farm 1000 acres, and you got 80% back (meaning 20% of it died), you would only have 800 acres worth of food compared to the original 1000. That is 200 acres of food that was destroyed by weeds, insects, and more (Halweil).

Click on the graph below to go to a website with other interactive maps/graphs.

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