Pesticide environmental risk, domestic crop production and biodiversity in Europe: the need for better landscape management

Abstract Chemical pesticides are often implicated in the ongoing declines of European farmland biodiversity. Pesticides support intensive agriculture in the EU, but environmental and human health risks must be managed and weighed against the need for crop production. Here I attempt a balanced review of the current EU pesticide regulatory process with a focus on environmental risk assessment. I find there are key weaknesses, for example with regards accounting for exposure to multiple active substances, and that wildlife are routinely exposed to residues of multiple active substances at the landscape scale, with apparent trophic level effects. Linking observed exposure to effects is problematic, however, and pesticides are not the only driver of biodiversity loss. I discuss the need to maintain crop production in the EU to avoid off-shoring environmental disbenefits, in the context of the EU Green deal, and in light of ongoing biodiversity declines. I consider the potential for increased landscape heterogeneity to complement the aims of pesticide regulation by promoting farmland biodiversity and crop beneficial ecosystem services, and potentially to mitigate, in some scenarios, negative effects of pesticides. I explore the available policy instruments to promote landscape heterogeneity, barriers to uptake and scenario-specific concrete measures. I conclude that residue-aware environmental risk assessment and reduced pesticide use through measures such as plant breeding, integrated pest management and precision application of pesticides, coupled with enhanced landscape heterogeneity to promote biodiversity and mitigate some pesticide effects, offer potential to achieve the desired outcome of reversing biodiversity decline while ensuring ongoing EU crop production.