Poisoned promise

Toxicity from intensive use of pesticides is rising globally. In India, levels exceed the global average in Indo-Gangetic plains

- SHAGUN NEW DELHI

PESTICIDE USE is rising not just in volume but also intensity, posing major threats to ecologically important species as well as to human health. And this pesticide toxicity is driven by just four countries: India, China, Brazil and the US. These are the results of a February 5 study published by researchers with the University of Kaiserslautern-Landau, Germany in the journal Science.

The paper reviewed 625 pesticides used globally to understand progress in the goal to halve pesticide risks by 2030 (relative to 2010-20 levels). This goal was adopted at the 15th Conference of the Parties (COP15) to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in 2022, under the Global Biodiversity Framework. The study uses “total applied toxicity” (TAT), a metric adopted at CBD'S COP16 in 2025, to gauge the reduction goal. TAT weighs the amount of pesticide used against how harmful each chemical is to different species groups. By this measure, India, Brazil, China and the US contribute 53-68 per cent of global pesticide toxicity.