For more than 40 years agriculture has largely relied on the use of pesticides to control insects, diseases and weeds, even though efforts have been made to limit the adverse effects of their use on our ecosystems (pollution of water courses and soil, erosion of biodiversity, etc) and human health. The legislation adopted last year by the European Union on the registration and use of pesticides has created a new context for agriculture: in coming years farmers will no longer have access to the range of chemicals used today, they will have to adopt the principles of Integrated Pest Management and introduce new, alternative methods which allow them to reduce their dependence on the use of pesticides.
Responding to these new requirements is a challenge and requires research and innovations. ENDURE is meeting this challenge by sharing resources and creating synergies on a European scale.
A great diversity of situations and agricultural practices in different European countries
In a ground-breaking move at the European level, ENDURE completed nine case studies based on common problems found in popular crops, such as diseases in wheat and vineyards, controlling weeds in maize etc. By comparing pest problems and crop protection practices between European countries, these studies made it possible to share the solutions used locally and to evaluate their potential for application on a broader scale. ENDURE has also sought to understand why the amount of pesticides used on the same crop varies considerably depending on the country in question. For wheat, for example, in addition to the climatic differences between countries, other factors are at work, such as the choice of production techniques and the use of resistant varieties, the organisation of the advisory sector, the existence of national early warning systems and research, and also the size and structure of the farms. In the case of apple and pear orchards, ENDURE’s case study has shown that despite widespread knowledge on tools for integrated production, a major brake on their use is the lack of acceptance in the market for fruit from resistant varieties.
Through these comparisons on a European level, ENDURE has shed new light on the drivers which can be used to encourage the introduction of Integrated Pest Management.
Working at crop system scales for future solutions
ENDURE’s work has demonstrated that it will be possible to further reduce dependence on pesticides by focusing not on one particular pest in one particular crop but in rethinking Europe’s principal cropping systems. A novel feature of ENDURE has been its ability to bring together researchers from various disciplines, such as agronomy, genetics, ecology, economy and sociology, and to provide them with a multidisciplinary research space in the form of system case studies. Three studies have been conducted, two on arable crops (winter based cropping systems and maize) and one on a permanent crop (orchards), and they have allowed ENDURE to propose and evaluate innovative strategies based on techniques which are currently seldom implemented or are still at the experimental stage. To achieve this, ENDURE introduced an original methodology and approaches, in particular a multicriteria tool to evaluate the sustainability of the crop systems. Called DEXiPM, it incorporates criteria to assess economic, environmental and social performance.
Results and resources for continued research in Integrated Pest Management
By sharing European knowledge and human resources in the field of Integrated Pest Management, ENDURE has identified the principal research areas which can help enrich these innovative strategies. For example, it examined the Decision Support Systems available to farmers and established a prototype for applying precision agriculture techniques designed to optimise treatments. ENDURE has also shown, for example, that dependence on weed killers can be reduced by rotating and diversifying crops over several years, that the duration of disease resistance is increased by the management of varieties and that beyond the farmer’s field, the distribution of crops and non-cultivated areas at a landscape level can slow the spread of harmful insects.
Experimental resources, databases, models and tools produced by the network have been brought together in a shared resource, the Virtual Laboratory, which will aid future research. In the Virtual Laboratory you can find, for example, a database on the ecology of 21 weed species, a platform for sharing information to support integrated protection against wheat diseases and a collaborative platform to harmonise the characterisation of pests and the evaluation of the damage they cause.
Sustained support for the implementation of Integrated Pest Management and public policy on pesticides
ENDURE’s sociologists have shown that the contribution of agricultural advisers and how advisory services are organised are key factors in the implementation of Integrated Pest Management. ENDURE chose to target its first results to advisers in the form of leaflets (From Science to Field), guides which contain immediately usable information. It has also created the freely accessible ENDURE Information Centre, offering online access to the most effective, and proven, IPM methods in Europe. A European network of more than 130 advisers has been assembled around this common tool.
As demanded by the European Commission, ENDURE has also provided scientific insights for policy makers charged with the implementation of the ‘pesticides package’, as well as working at the European Union level and in Member States through its Network of Experts and the completion of expert studies. As part of this programme, it has also produced a Foresight Study, Crop Protection in Europe in 2030, which helps to identify the factors likely to impact the evolution of crop protection systems.
Almost all of the partners in the Network of Excellence have decided to maintain ENDURE beyond its European funding in the form of a European Research Group (ERG). ENDURE ERG will be seeking to establish itself as the European scientific point of reference in crop protection, a crossroads of shared data and research initiatives addressing the needs of advisers and policy makers in future years.
ENDURE partners: ACTA (Association de coordination technique agricole), CIRAD, INRA, INRA Transfert - France; Julius Kühn Institute - Germany; Rothamsted Research – UK; Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Scuola Superiore di Studi Universitarie di Perfezionamento Sant'Anna – Italy; Plant Breeding and Acclimatization Institute – Poland; Agroscope Swiss Federal Research – Switzerland; Plant Research International – Netherlands; Aarhus University, Danish Agricultural Advisory Service – Denmark; Szent István University – Hungary; Universitat de Lleida – Spain; International Biocontrol Manufacturers Association (IBMA).
1 European Network for the Durable Exploitation of Crop Protection Strategies
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