Appendix 1 Review of major arable integrated farming research projects
Contents
1Pesticides, Cereal Farming and the Environment. The Boxworth Project
1.1Summary
1.2Relevance to policy
1.2.1Energy
1.2.2Climate change
1.2.3Waste
1.2.4Water
1.2.5Food and farming
1.2.6Resource protection
2The Talisman and Scarab Projects
2.1Summary
2.2Relevance to policy
2.2.1Energy
2.2.2Climate change
2.2.3Waste
2.2.4Water
2.2.5Food and farming
2.2.6Resource protection
3LINK Integrated Farming Systems
3.1Summary
3.2Relevance to policy
3.2.1Energy
3.2.2Climate change
3.2.3Waste
3.2.4Water
3.2.5Food and farming
3.2.6Resource protection
4Sustainable Arable Farming for an Improved Environment (SAFFIE)
4.1Summary
4.2Relevance to policy
4.2.1Energy
4.2.2Climate change
4.2.3Waste
4.2.4Water
4.2.5Food and farming
4.2.6Resource protection
5LIFE
5.1Summary
5.2Relevance to policy
5.2.1Energy
5.2.2Climate change
5.2.3Waste
5.2.4Water
5.2.5Food and farming
5.2.6Resource protection
6Focus on farming practice (FOFP)
6.1Summary
6.2Relevance to policy
6.2.1Energy
6.2.2Climate change
6.2.3Waste
6.2.4Water
6.2.5Food and farming
6.2.6Resource protection
7Rhône-Poulenc 3-D farming
7.1Summary
7.2Relevance to policy
7.2.1Energy
7.2.2Climate change
7.2.3Waste
7.2.4Water
7.2.5Food and farming
7.2.6Resource protection
1Pesticides, Cereal Farming and the Environment. The Boxworth Project
Greig-Smith, P, Frampton, G.K, and Hardy, A.R. London, HMSO. 1992.
1.1Summary
The Boxworth Project (1981–1991) was commissioned and funded by MAFF to investigate the effects of pesticide use in cereals on a range of wildlife, including plants, birds, small mammals, and arthropods (e.g. insects, mites and spiders). Therefore, the project was not conceived or designed with an Integrated Farm Management (IFM) remit. However, the Project broke new ground as it was the first largescale, multidisciplinary study in the UK to provide a longterm comparison of different farming systems and included many elements which are today embodied in IFM practices. The Boxworth Project was thus, primarily, an ecological study with economic inputs and outputs monitored incidentally. The following three main aims were central to the Project:
- to examine and compare the environmental and ecological sideeffects of contrasting pesticide regimes;
- to monitor the economics of crop production under contrasting pesticide regimes and to establish the commercial viability of reducedinput farming;
- to identify any difficulties that might arise in the practical management of reducedinput farming systems, with particular reference to pesticide use.
ADAS Boxworth (formerly Boxworth Experimental Husbandry Farm) provided a wholefarm study area in which the various effects of the contrasting pesticide regimes could be investigated. The farm was divided into three areas, each a block of contiguous fields. After two years (1981–1983) of baseline monitoring of flora and fauna, the following three pesticide regimes were applied to contiguous groups of fields on the farm for a period of five consecutive cropping years (1983–1988).
- A ‘Full Insurance’ regime which involved high inputs and prophylactic treatments, imitating an intensive cereal production system of the late 1970s.
- A ‘Supervised’ regime whereby pesticides were applied only if weeds, diseases or pests exceeded economic thresholds.
- An ‘Integrated’ regime using economic thresholds and husbandry practices which further reduce the need for pesticides.
In practice, in terms of pesticide inputs, there was little difference between the ‘supervised’ and ‘integrated’ treatment regimes.
The main conclusions stemming from the project were as follows:
- Populations of birds and mammals were apparently resilient to the effects of the highinput approach.
Although wood mice (Apodemus sylvaticus) were killed by broadcast molluscicide pellets, immigration of juvenile mice from untreated areas allowed a rapid recovery in numbers, and there was no evidence of any longterm effects of pesticide use on wood mice populations. This finding highlights the need to avoid use of any detrimental farming activity across wide areas and many holdings, such that it restricts the potential of local migration to build up numbers irrespective of the cause of decline, be it man made or natural.
- Some beneficial arthropods were vulnerable to pesticides.
This was due to differences between species in their physical exposure, their inherent susceptibility and the capacity of populations to recover after adverse pesticide events.
- Lower input systems of crop protection are not necessarily less economically viable.
As expected, crop yields were higher in the Full Insurance regime, but despite lower yields, the profitability of the Supervised approach was greater than the Full Insurance regime. The Integrated regime gave the lowest yields and economic returns because attempts to reduce pesticide use below that of the Supervised approach led to problems with grass weeds. However, the performance of the Integrated regime within the Boxworth Project was recognised to be unsatisfactory in many ways and not fully representative of how a lowinput, fully integrated system would be designed.
Therefore, important conclusions of the Boxworth Project, which remain highly relevant today, were that very high inputs of pesticides are unlikely to be required in a wellmanaged crop, are likely to result in adverse environmental sideeffects, and are unlikely to result in additional economic benefits.
1.2Relevance to policy
1.2.1Energy
There are no records of energy use made within the project.
1.2.2Climate change
There is little data directly applicable for use in climate change research within the project.
1.2.3Waste
Pesticides were applied to the ‘full insurance’ programme based on weed, pest and disease problems expected to occur regardless of whether the problem occurred or not. In the insurance and supervised treatments reduced rates were used, the reductions were arbitrary and not based on weed, pest and disease levels present.
1.2.4Water
Field drains were sampled and analysed for selected pesticides in the Full Insurance and Integrated areas towards the end of the project. Sampling started when drains began to run and was conducted from autumn to spring 1987-8, at approximately two-week intervals and again in autumn 1988 until late December 1988. The monitoring strategy did not allow any comparison between the two areas, with few pesticides monitored in the Integrated area.
Most monitoring was conducted in winter wheat, except for the herbicide simazine, which was monitored in winter beans. The only pesticide analysed that was common to both areas was the molluscicide methiocarb, which was not detected in any samples. Three insecticides were monitored in the Full Insurance area: cypermethrin, triazophos and chlorpyriphos. Only chlorpyriphos was detected and only on one occasion, at a concentration of 0.06 g/l, 12 days after application in December 1987.
Several herbicides were detected in drainage from the Full Insurance area, with highest concentrations in the first samples after application and lower concentrations subsequently, as shown below:
Herbicide / Application date / Concentration (g/l)tri-allate / Oct / 0.05 – 0.25
metoxuron / Nov / 0.06 – 3.30
methabenzthiazuron / Nov / 0.07 – 0.40
isoproturon / Mar / 0.32 – 2.16
Simazine, applied to winter beans in the Integrated area, was also monitored, following application in October 1988. A concentration of 35 g/l was detected in the first sample taken, one month after application, but this dropped to 0.39 g/l in subsequent samples (exact time-scale not specified).
There was no data on nitrogen , phosphate or sediment.
The results yield little information about the benefits of integrated management, on pesticide pollution. Some of the pesticides, in particular herbicides, applied in the Full Insurance area were completely omitted from the Integrated area, so there was no comparative monitoring to be conducted in these cases. The detection of autumn-applied herbicides in drainage water has been widely reported, both residual (soil-active) and non-residual herbicides. The concentrations found in the Boxworth Project are not at all unusual[1]. (See, for example, Harris, 1995.)
Two conclusions can be drawn, which offer some guidance to pesticide management in integrated systems. The concentrations detected were highest soon after application and declined sharply over the following weeks or months. The same observation made in the Brimstone experiment[2] (Jones et al, 2000) led to guidance in the isoproturon stewardship scheme that leaching risk is minimised by herbicide application as much in advance of field drainage commencing in Autumn as possible. Secondly, the sharp decline in concentrations detected with time after application is some indication that long-term persistence of residues may not be a problem.
1.2.5Food and farming
Economics
Highest yields were from full pesticide systems, but similar gross margins were obtained from IFM. This type of financial outcome was to be common in many of the IFM studies that followed. The importance of variety selection and controlling weeds and diseases was highlighted, i.e. need to use some inputs on a precautionary basis.
Food
At the time of the project long runs of cereals were typical in the locality. Wheat was selected as the standard crop with a break of oilseed rape every 5 years. Crop choice was standardised between the rotations.
Pesticideuse
The full suite of planned applications in the Full Insurance approach were not always realised, chiefly because of problems of access to fields in inclement weather. The Full Insurance approach averaged 14.4 pesticide applications per annum, compared with 6.8 and 6.1 applications per annum in the Supervised and Integrated approaches, respectively. Therefore, the Supervised and Integrated approaches both allowed pesticide use to be reduced to about the same extent, which was on average less than half of the applications made to the Full Insurance fields. This was particularly marked for insecticide use, which was only one-sixth of that in the Full Insurance approach. However, the Full Insurance level of pesticide input was recognised to be artificially high for Boxworth, where pest problems are not usually serious, but it was, nevertheless, representative of pesticide use by the most intensive cereal growers when the Project started.
Both of the reducedinput programmes (Supervised and Integrated) gave a level of pesticide use that was comparable to the husbandry of the fields before the start of the project, which was reflected in the inputs in the two baseline years. This indicated that the Full Insurance area experienced a sudden rise from moderate to high inputs, whereas the Supervised and Integrated programmes did not differ greatly from previous conditions, and would not be expected to produce any major ecological changes.
Schemes
The project did not relate to any current agri-environmental schemes.
1.2.6Resource protection
Land
Compared to modern times the pesticide regimes and cultivation methods seem very intensive but were typical of their time. The project recognised the need to move towards lower inputs and was the first of it’s kind to cover this area of research.
Soil
The effects on soil were not incorporated into the project.
Biodiversity
This large-scale, multi-disciplinary study included the consideration of the effects of pesticides in field situations on mammals, birds and invertebrates, and only woodmice were found to be directly adversely affected by pesticide use; a broadcast molluscide. There was no evidence of mammalian population changes that could be attributed to the Full Insurance programme of pesticide use.
The study also found that the field populations of wood mice were reduced after husbandry activities such as harvesting and ploughing. This is not discussed in relation to IFM, but it indicates that the provision of refuge areas such as hedges and margins would be important. Also, IFM, with its reduced applications and cultivations could be expected to have less of an effect on field small mammals than standard production systems.
The number of crop invertebrates varied with pesticide use – some species increased and some decreased. This is explained by authors as being related to factors such as degree of exposure, capacity for recolonisation and effects on prey, competitors and natural enemies. The value of field margins for invertebrates is highlighted.
Overall, the density of herbivorous invertebrates in the Full Insurance programme declined by 50% compared with the other treatments. Declines in carnivores were similar, but detritivores were little affected. The workers also demonstrated a rapid build up of aphid numbers when predators were excluded from the reduced-input area.
It was concluded that bird numbers were not adversely affected by the Full Insurance Programme. It was, however, noted that immigration of birds into the site was not effectively monitored. Potentially debilitating effects on house sparrows, starlings and skylarks were noted after the spraying of summer aphicides. Bird populations are Defra indicators of sustainable agriculture, (MAFF 2000[3], Defra 2002[4]).
This was the first large scale study of this kind. A wide range of animals was monitored and the importance of biodiversity is emphasised for future work. The consideration of the effects of chemicals may be useful when trying to isolate the other effects of IFM operations in multi-functional studies.
Landscape
There is no reference to landscape within the project but the supervised and integrated systems allow maintenance of the landscape with reduced environmental effects.
2The Talisman and Scarab Projects
Eds Young, J., Griffin,M.J., Alford, D.V., and Ogilvy,S.E., DEFRA 2001.
2.1Summary
The TALISMAN and SCARAB research projects (1990–1998) were commissioned and funded by MAFF and specifically designed as followon studies to address, in more detail, many of the issues raised by the Boxworth Project (see review entry0). TALISMAN (Towards A Lower Input System Minimising Agrochemicals and Nitrogen) and SCARAB (Seeking Confirmation About Results At Boxworth) complemented each other in their aims and objectives; TALISMAN focused primarily on the economic issues of reducing pesticide and fertiliser use, whilst SCARAB was driven by the need to examine in detail many of the questions surrounding the ecological sideeffects of pesticides. Neither TALISMAN nor SCARAB was conceived or designed with an Integrated Farm Management (IFM) remit. The Projects lacked many of the cultural elements of weed, pest and disease control which are required in an IFM system. Nevertheless, TALISMAN and SCARAB share many common features with IFM, particularly in relation to achieving economically sustainable reductions in pesticide use.
The sixyear TALISMAN project aimed to measure the economic and agronomic implications of reducing inputs of pesticides and nitrogen fertilisers to arable crops at three locations in England by comparing low and highinput pesticide regimes in two contrasting arable crop rotations. The ‘Standard Rotation’ was based entirely on autumnsown cereals and break crops such as winter beans and winter oilseed rape. In contrast, the ‘Alternative Rotation’ contained a high proportion of spring-sown cereals and break crops. The main pesticide regimes applied to these rotations were either: Current Commercial Practice (CCP), with nitrogen fertiliser and pesticides applied according to manufacturers’ recommended rates, or, a Low Input Approach (LIA) in which nitrogen rates were applied at 50 per cent below CCP and pesticide applications omitted or applied at no more than 50 per cent of the rates used in CCP.
In contrast to TALISMAN, SCARAB was driven primarily by the need to make indepth observations on the ecological effects of pesticides. The impacts of the two levels of pesticide use were assessed over a sixyear period at three sites in England. Current Farm Practice (CFP) mirrored the practices of a typical, technically competent and financially aware farmer, with pesticides applied at manufacturers’ recommended rates. In comparison, no insecticides, molluscicides or nematicides were used in the Reduced Input Approach (RIA). Fungicides and herbicides, at reduced or full rates, were applied only where required to avoid a significant reduction in crop yield or value. Key findings of the SCARAB Project were as follows:
- Short-lived effects of insecticides occurred among different groups of nontarget arthropods in all fields and all years. However, recovery usually followed within the same season.
- Long-term negative effects of the conventional pesticide regime on arthropods were detected only in one out of eight sites, which was under a grass and wheat rotation, and related to certain species soildwelling springtails (Collembola).
- Pesticide effects on soil bacteria and fungi showed no clear-cut pattern and were highly dependent on soil type and soil condition at the time of application. At one site, there was a suggestion that the potential for microbial recycling of organic matter was greater where reduced pesticide inputs were used.
- There were no apparent longterm trends in earthworm populations, or individual species, which could be related to pesticide use.
- The complete absence of insecticides and nematicides in the SCARAB reducedinput treatment gave a commercial disadvantage and led to reduced profits in some cases, most noticeably in the highvalue crops of potatoes and sugar beet. In practice, however, a more flexible approach to reducing pesticide use would be adopted to prevent reductions in profitability.
2.2Relevance to policy
2.2.1Energy
2.2.2Climate change
No direct measurements of pollution were made. The reductions in nitrogen and pesticide use investigated may have led to lower emissions of these substances to water and the atmosphere, but this was not tested.
TALISMAN reported negative Apparent Nitrogen Balances under reduced nitrogen fertiliser treatments, at some sites. Although this might be considered beneficial, in that excess N is being removed from the environment, the authors consider that this is not necessarily so. Long-term reductions in N use may result in lower soil organic matter levels and this could lead to a deterioration in soil structure and an increased risk of soil erosion. Reductions in soil organic matter are likely also to result in a net release of greenhouse gases, (not discussed in report).
SCARAB found some evidence for reduced soil microbial biomass under the conventional pesticide regime, compared to the low-input regime. There was also an indication of greater microbial recycling of organic matter, where reduced pesticide inputs were used. The authors suggest that reduced soil organic matter turnover in a conventional regime could lead to an increased need for fertiliser inputs, to make up the shortfall in microbially-processed nutrients. Again, there may also be implications for soil structural stability and erosion risk, if reduced biomass and organic matter cycling lead to a less stable soil structure. Further, an increased microbial biomass may enhance the ability of the soil to degrade contaminants such as pesticides. These latter aspects were not discussed further in the report.