Preface

The first book section (Chapters 1-6) addresses the benefits of the pest control for crop protection and food supply increasing, but also the associated risks of food contamination. The advantages and the disadvantages of pesticides using in modern agriculture, and the effectiveness of their alternatives are comprehensively reviewed in Chapter 1. The objective of Chapter 2 is to assess the impacts of agrochemicals application on plants' pests and of some essential production factors on the quality of the vegetables produced in African urban settings. Chapter 3 reports research results on the efficacy of the insecticides imidacloprid, thiamethoxam, clothianidin, methidathion and fenobucarb and of their mixtures against the citrus psyllid on citrus plants in Vietnam. Chapter 4 examines the use of pesticides in cocoa production in Ghana, demonstrates that the current unsustainable agricultural practices create environmental and economic risks, and identifies improvement options. Chapter 5 provides data on industrial chemicals and organochlorine pesticides contamination of food. Chapter 6 documents the contamination of bee products with pesticides and presents information on the sources of contamination.

The second book section (Chapters 7-20) is dedicated to the environmental pesticides impacts. Chapter 7 comments on a number of pesticides ecological effects such as: effects involving pollinators, effects on nutrient cycling in ecosystems, effects on soil erosion, structure and fertility, and effects on water quality. The impacts of the pesticides in agricultural ecosystems, in terms of pesticides resistance development are discussed in Chapter 8. The occurrence of the inorganic pesticide lead arsenate in the environment, the pathways of its uptake, the methods for lead and arsenic toxicity assessment, and the contaminated soil remediation constitute the subject of Chapter 9. The effects of arsenic exposure are commented in details in Chapter 10.

Chapters 11-13 covers the genotoxic and immunotoxic effects of pesticides on the aquatic fauna: decapods, bivalves, and teleost fish. Using zooplancton to evaluate the ecotoxicity of the main pesticide applied in paddy field is discussed in Chapter 14. Investigations on the capacity of some herbal extracts and calcium to counteract the

Volume 3 of the book series "Pesticides in the Modern World" is a compilation of 29 chapters focused on: pesticides and food production, environmental effects of pesticides, and pesticides mobility, transport and fate.

#### XIV Preface

pesticidal effects on Indian Major Carp are reported in Chapter 15. Comments concerning the assessment of the pesticides residues in otters and ospreys, considered as good sentinels and indicator species of contamination, bioaccumulation and biomagnification of toxic contaminants in rivers, estuaries, reservoirs and lakes are provided in Chapter 16.

Chapter 17 presents cases of insecticides miss-use in rice production in West Africa and the related effects on the non-target organisms and the environment. The possible impacts of Bt maize on the development and behaviour of stem borers and their natural enemies are analysed in Chapter 18. Experimental data on the termiticidal activity of bistrifluron are reported in Chapter 19. Camouflaging of seeds treated with pesticides to mitigate the mortality of birds in grain crops is discussed in Chapter 20.

The third book section (Chapters 21-29) furnishes numerous data contributing to the better understanding of the pesticides mobility, transport and fate. In Chapter 21 are presented investigations on the mode of deposition and transformation of the organochlorine pesticides into the sediment of Lake Liangzi in Central China. Chapters 22-24 address the complex phenomenon of environmental *pollutants transport* in surface and ground waters. Studies on the presence of pesticides in treated urban wastewaters are reported in Chapter 25. The fate of the pesticides in soils, namely the interaction of ionic pesticides with model systems of soil fractions, the imidacloprid sorption and degradation processes, and the release kinetics of organochlorine pesticides in the rhizosphere are discussed in Chapters 26-28. The factors involved in the retention and degradation of pesticides in soils are analysed in Chapter 29, applying an integrated approach.

The addressed in this book issues associated with the benefits and risks of pesticides should attract the public concern to support rational decisions to pesticides use. The efforts of all the contributing authors to provide recent information are greatly appreciated.

> **Margarita Stoytcheva**  Mexicali, Baja California Mexico

**Part 1** 

**Pesticides and Food** 

**1** 

*Iran* 

**Role of Pesticides in Human Life** 

Seyed Soheil Saeedi Saravi and Mohammad Shokrzadeh *Department of Toxicology-Pharmacology, Faculty of Pharmacy,* 

Food production capacity is faced with an ever-growing number of challenges, including a world population expected to grow to nearly 10 billion by 2050 and a falling ratio of arable land to population. Based on evidences, in 1900 there were 1.6 billion people on the planet; in 1992 this had risen to 5.25 billion and by the year 2050 it will reach 10 billion. World population is increasing by 97 million per year. This explosive increase in world population is mostly in developing countries and this is where the need for food is greatest and starvation threatens human life; as, FAO1 estimates that 500 million are already

Civilization has been combating weeds, insects, diseases and other pests throughout history and there are many examples of how these pests have had a major impact on humans. One of the worst examples is the Black Plaque of Europe in the fourteenth century when millions died from a bacterial disease spread by fleas from rats (Hock et al., 1991). Another example is the infamous Irish potato famine of the nineteenth century in which millions died and many more were forced to emigrate. A fungus also destroyed the entire German potato crop in the early twentieth century resulting in 700,000 deaths from

Thus, food plays a vital and strategic role in growing global population. But, food production is encounter to different limits. For example, there is a limit to new areas to cultivate; therefore we must increase agricultural production from the areas available. However, the specialization of production units has led to the image that agriculture is a

In our global society there is a place for people to grow and consume organic food, but if all our farmers decided against using farm chemicals, we would soon find ourselves in a grave situation. Without the use of farm chemicals, the production and quality of food would be severely jeopardized with estimates that food supplies would immediately fall to 30 to 40% due to the ravages of pests (Anon, 1990b; Anon, 1992a). While there are mountains of food in Europe and the US, this represents only 45 days food supply for the world. Only part of

**1. Introduction** 

undernourished (Anon, 1990a).

starvation (Anon, 1992b).

 1 FAO

modern miracle of food production (Stoytcheva, 2011).

the problem is distribution and the ability to pay for purchases.

**in the Modern Age: A Review** 

 *Mazandaran University of Mediccal Sciences,* 
