PH24 Environmental Assessment, Environmental Toxicology
Exhibit Hall
8:00 AM - Thursday
(PH271) Pesticide leaching in peri-urban vegetable systems in China and Vietnam.
van den Bosch, Rik1, Chaowen, Lin2, Van Hoi, Pham 3, Van den Brink, Paul1, 1 Alterra, Wageningen, The Netherlands2 Soil and Fertilizer Institute (SFI), Chengdu, China3 Hanoi Agricultural University (HAU), Hanoi, Vietnam
ABSTRACT- In many peri-urban areas in Southeast Asia farmers shift from traditional subsistence farming to market oriented intensive vegetable farming. This is due to an increased demand for vegetables by the local urban population and by increased export. Deprived of information and experience with vegetable farming and focusing on avoiding risks, farmers see chemical inputs as the only choice for pest and disease control. The project collects baseline data on the use of agro-chemicals in vegetable farming in two study sites in The Red River Basin in Vietnam and Sichuan Province in China. An inventory is made of the types of pesticides used, their active ingredients, timing and quantities for a variety of crops by a total of 120 farmers. A pesticide leaching model is used to estimate the risks of leaching of pesticides used, taking into account the local climate and soil conditions. Within the same project participatory trials will be conducted with the farmers to test new production methods in order to produce safer food, get better prices and sustain soil fertility. The results of the model simulations will be used to estimate the risks of pesticide leaching to groundwater for the various tested production methods.
Key words: Groundwater, Risk Assessment, Tropics, South East Asia