Practice AP Environmental Science questions on integrated pest management, biological controls, physical controls, limited pesticides, and tradeoffs.
Pesticides have been utilized for many years to increase food production and control pest populations. Pesticide use can be both beneficial and harmful to humans and other organisms.
Cotton farmers in the southern United States used a chemical pesticide to control an insect cotton-crop pest over a 40-year period. To study the effectiveness of the pesticide as an insect pest-control strategy, traps were placed in treated cotton fields and the number of pests captured were compared to application rates for the pesticide. The results of the study are shown in the table below.
There are many problems associated with the repeated application of chemical pesticides to reduce pest populations.
Propose one reasonable method, other than crop rotation, of reducing the use of pesticides in agricultural practices while still maintaining a high crop yield.
Justify how the method proposed in (e)(ii) would provide a benefit to humans.