Pesticide resistance in intensive agricultural fields: a global issue

Carvalho, Leonardo Bianco dePereira, Liese de VargasMichelon, Micheli Fochesato

Pesticide resistance is a genetically based phenomenon and occurs when a pesticide is used on a population containing some individuals that are genetically predisposed to be resistant to that pesticide (BELLINGER 1996). Therefore, resistant individuals probably exist in any natural pest population and the misuse of pesticides tends to select the resistant pests over time. Repeated applications and higher treatment rates will kill increasing numbers of the pest but resistant survivors will pass on the resistance genes to the next generation (BELLINGER 1996). The pesticide selection also occurs at low treatment rates with a relative greater importance on standing genetic variation versus novel mutations on a relatively limited number of individuals and highly resistant individuals are very rare (BISI et al. 2013). In any case, the pest resistance evolution is becoming a global issue on agricultural fields where pesticides have been frequently used in the past 30 years.Resistance may be defined as a heritable change in the sensitivity of a pest population that is reflected in the repeated failure of a product to achieve the expected level of control when used according to the manufacturers recommendation for that pest species (IRAC 2015). (AU)