What transition pathways should be followed to reduce pesticide use and risks in Wallonia by 2035?

Halfway through the third Walloon Pesticide Reduction Plan (PWRP 3), SYTRA is compiling a detailed report on pesticide use by professionals and the health and environmental risks posed by the various agricultural sectors and production methods coexisting in the Walloon Region. It is proposing a set of levers for action to be activated in order to initiate a transition and significantly mitigate these impacts within 10 years.

This project is a continuation of work already carried out by Sytra on the future of Walloon agricultural sectors, and builds on the work done by Noé Vandevoorde as part of his thesis to adapt the pesticide load indicator (PLI) to the Walloon context in order to assess the actual risks to the environment and farmers’ health across the region.

The project is based on a set of methodological assumptions:

• A forward-looking approach, supporting public authorities: by assessing the impacts of different trend and transition scenarios;
• A participatory approach, involving transition stakeholders and sectoral representatives in the process and design of scenarios;
• A multi-scale approach: differentiating between agronomic contexts and production methods at the level of agricultural sectors and regions;
• A multi-indicator approach: by cross-referencing usage indicators (quantities of active substances) and risk indicators (ecotoxicity, environmental fate, human toxicity); the inventory provides an objective view of the areas where pesticide impacts can be reduced and forms the basis for the forward-looking exercise.