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Human Health and Ecosystem Quality Benefits with Life Cycle Assessment Due to Fungicides Elimination in Agriculture

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  • Georgios Archimidis Tsalidis

    (Biotechnology Department, Applied Sciences Faculty, Delft University of Technology, 2629 HZ Delft, The Netherlands
    Athena—Research and Innovation Center in Information, Communication and Knowledge Technologies, 67100 Xanthi, Greece)

Abstract

Industrial agriculture results in environmental burdens due to the overuse of fertilizers and pesticides. Fungicides is a class of pesticides whose application contributes (among others) to human toxicity and ecotoxicity. The European Union aims to increase organic agriculture. For this reason, this work aims to analyze climate change, freshwater ecotoxicity, terrestrial ecotoxicity, human toxicity, (terrestrial) acidification, and freshwater eutrophication impacts of fungicides and calculate expected benefits to human health (per European citizen) and ecosystem quality (terrestrial) with life cycle assessment (LCA) during crop production. The Scopus database was searched for LCA studies that considered the application of fungicides to specific crops. The analysis shows how many systemic and contact fungicides were considered by LCA studies and what was the applied dosage. Furthermore, it shows that fungicides highly contribute to freshwater ecotoxicity, terrestrial ecotoxicity, human toxicity, and freshwater eutrophication for fruits and vegetables, but to a low extent compared to all considered environmental impacts in the case of cereals and rapeseed. Expected benefits to human health and ecosystem quality after fungicides elimination are greater for fruits and vegetables, ranging between 0 to 47 min per European citizen in a year and 0 to 90 species per year, respectively.

Suggested Citation

  • Georgios Archimidis Tsalidis, 2022. "Human Health and Ecosystem Quality Benefits with Life Cycle Assessment Due to Fungicides Elimination in Agriculture," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(2), pages 1-12, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:2:p:846-:d:723117
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    2. Caferra, Rocco & D'Adamo, Idiano & Morone, Piergiuseppe, 2023. "Wasting energy or energizing waste? The public acceptance of waste-to-energy technology," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 263(PE).

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