Gli obiettivi del Green Deal europeo di espandere l'agricoltura biologica al 25%, di dimezzare l'uso e il rischio di pesticidi e di proteggere le aree sensibili dall'impatto negativo dei pesticidi entro il 2030 stanno rendendo i pesticidi naturali consentiti nell'agricoltura biologica sempre più oggetto di interesse politico.
Organic farming is not what it claims to be. Organic farmers also spray poisons - and not in short supply. Whether synthetic or natural is irrelevant. This is what the advocates of an industrial model of agriculture are increasingly claiming, thus damaging the reputation of organic farming. Reason enough for a fact check.
There is much debate about whether the (mostly synthetic) pesticide active substances (AS) in conventional agriculture have different non-target effects than the natural AS in organic agriculture. We evaluated the official EU pesticide database to compare 256 AS that may only be used on conventional farmland with 134 AS that are permitted on organic farmland.