The Level of Farmers’ Knowledge About the Risks of Pesticides on the Environment in Samarra District / Salah Al-Din Governorate

Abstract The research aims to determine the level of farmers’ knowledge of the risks of pesticides on the environment in Samarra District/Salah al-Din Governorate. And to determine the correlation between the level of farmers’ knowledge of the risks of pesticides on the environment and each of the personal factors (age, educational attainment, size of the cultivated area, number of years of pesticide use, sources of information)., the trend towards training). And arranging the research areas according to the level of farmers’ knowledge in descending order. And identifying the problems that farmers in the Samarra District suffer from when using pesticides. The research included all farmers in the Samarra District, who numbered (413) farmers, and a random sample was taken from them at a rate of (10%). Thus, increasing sources of information increases farmers’ knowledge about the harmful effects of pesticides. The research sample became (41) farmers. The results showed that the general level of knowledge about the use of agricultural pesticides among the respondents is average and tends to decrease, and that increasing sources of information increases farmers’ knowledge about the harmful effects of pesticides, due to the high percentage of those with an average level of knowledge and the presence of a percentage of those with a low level of knowledge among the respondents regarding the use of pesticides. This requires that the Agricultural Extension Service, represented by the Agricultural Division in the Samarra District and the Extension Department in the Governorate’s Agriculture Directorate, work to disseminate knowledge and modern methods regarding the issue of the use of agricultural pesticides, their harms, and methods of reducing their harms, and to pay attention to training farmers in the Samarra District by introducing them to training courses. In the areas of pesticide damage, focusing on areas in which information has been shown to be weak.