Modelling the path to better soil-applied pesticides

This project will enable efficacy and environmental protection to be optimised for soil-applied pesticides, supporting rational product design and regulatory approval. Simulation models are the primary basis for regulating pesticides against EU ground- and surface-water protection standards, but the current models cannot explicitly represent plants or their roots, or the effects of formulations and formulation placement strategies. This project will create a conceptual framework for representing local pesticide concentrations in the whole soil-plant system, and will use it to produce a spatially-competent simulation model. By relating local concentrations of pesticides to product efficacy, it will be possible to use the model to rationally design better active ingredients, formulations and placement strategies. The new model will also enable the environmental benefit of advanced formulations and placement strategies to be quantified in a cost-effective way for the first time. This offers the prospect of being able to gain credit in the regulatory approval process for these technologies, offsetting the negative economic effects of evolving regulation.