West Africa: Farmer training to revolutionize pesticide management

New York, Feb 18 : Field schools that train farmers in alternative methods of pest control have succeeded in nearly eliminating the use of toxic pesticides by a community of cotton growers in Mali, according to a new study out on Monday based on a project led by the UN Food and Agriculture Agency (FAO).

"We must learn from farmers' experience. Pragmatic, field-based and farmer-centric education can and must play a key role in making agriculture stronger and more sustainable," said FAO Director-General Jose Graziano da Silva in a press release.

The study, published on Monday by the London-based Royal Society, was conducted in two areas - the Bla region of southern Mali, where FAO established a field school program in 2003, and a second area, Bougouni, where the program was not yet active.

While only 34 percent of all cotton-farmers in the area participated in the program, pesticide use on all of Bla's cotton farms - more than 4,300 households - dropped a staggering 92 percent. FAO's study further found that the move away from pesticide use had no negative impact on yields.

The Bougouni area, where training has not yet taken place, saw no change in pesticide use over the same eight-year period. This suggests that knowledge of alternative methods in pest control was further disseminated by program participants to other farmers in the area, underscoring the potential of farmer field schools to act as catalysts for widespread practice change.

Slashing their use of chemicals and shifting to alternative "biopesticides" like neem tree extract, growers in the Bla study group reduced their average individual production costs. By refraining from applying more than 47,000 liters of toxic pesticides, the farmers saved nearly half a million dollars over the study period.

Training farmers in alternative methods of pest control proved to be three times more cost-effective than purchasing and using synthetic pesticides, according to FAO's analysis. More than 20,000 cotton farmers have been through field schools in Mali.

"At the end of the day, sustainable intensification will be the result of the collective action of millions of small farmers, who through their daily decisions determine the trajectory of agricultural ecosystems across the world," Graziano da Silva said.

Two related studies from the same FAO project also published on Monday by the Royal Society - authored by Oregon State University (OSU) scientists together with researchers in West Africa and at various institutions, including FAO - reveal the extent to which pesticide use in West Africa poses risks to human health and environment.

One of these studies, conducted in 19 different communities in five West African countries, used state-of-the-art risk assessment models to provide the first detailed analysis of pesticide risks for this region. The results highlight a number of specific pesticides that pose widespread and significant threats to human health and terrestrial and aquatic wildlife throughout the region.

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West Africa: Farmer training to revolutionize pesticide management