Should We Use Pesticides?
Should we use pesticides?
In this essay I will be arguing as to whether we should or should not utilise pesticides after presenting a balanced view on how pesticides affect our economy, our environment, including wildlife, and our own health. I will also compare chemical pesticides to biological pesticides after examining the effects of the more conventional and widely used chemical pesticides.
A pesticide is a substance which is used for preventing or lessening the damage caused by a pest (1). A pest is an organism that competes with humans for food, destroys property, is an irritant or spread disease. These organisms include insects, fungi, weeds, molluscs, rodents, and nematode worms (2). Pesticides can be classified as synthetic pesticides, or biological pesticides. Broad spectrum pesticides are designed to kill a large number of species, as well as selective pesticides, which are only able to kill a smaller more specific number of species or even just one species.
Chemical pesticides can help to prevent economical losses to humans by using fungicides to prevent stored plant based foods from rotting, as well as averting wet rot and/or dry rot in wooden buildings. Humans could also use insecticides to kill agricultural pests such as aphids and locusts, in addition to treating domestic animals for skin parasites. Farmers could also use rodenticide to prevent mice and rats from eating their annual yield, stored in granaries and food stores. Herbicides are also used regularly to kill weeds which compete with crop plants for the same natural resources (2), as well as invasive plant species which could damage the local environment. Pesticides can also be used to kill mosquitoes which transmit potentially fatal diseases like malaria. Pesticides can therefore help farmers to save money by preventing serious crop damage from insects, birds and weeds, as well as preventing serious illness in Third World countries.
However, chemical pesticides can also cause...
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