The most widespread method of keeping pests at bay is by chemical intervention.

Created with the ultimate goal of killing

the invading pests, there are many different branches of toxins used on crops. Currently more than 1,000 pesticides are used
around the world to prevent food damage, each with varying properties and toxic effects. The majority of insecticides are
chemically engineered or naturally affect the nervous systems of an array of pest insects.

Most of the pesticides used today affect the way insect neurons receive instructions to function by changing the sodium and
potassium balance between the nerve cells. They either prevent a signal being generated or overstimulate the
nerves so that they misfire. Either of these malfunctions of the nervous system will paralyse and then kill the pest.
Using chemical insecticides has been a controversial practice for some years, with their risk to human health being a major issue.
In larger quantities pesticides can cause serious health issues, or even be fatal to someone that is
exposed to them. However, pesticides in the past have caused larger scale problems in the surrounding ecosystem.

Developed as the first modern synthetic pesticide in the 1940s, dichlorodiphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT) is now
remembered as the biggest mistake in the history of agricultural pest control. Created to combat pest-borne diseases like
malaria and typhus, the use of DDT quickly became its own health hazard. When exposed to high doses, it could cause vomiting,
tremors and even seizures. Although highly effective as a pesticide, DDT was also very good at bioaccumulating, whereby an
animal, such as a bird, eats the pest killed by DDT and accumulates it in their bodies, leading to a whole host of health issues.
This includes making the shells of birds’ eggs so thin that they break during incubation, destroying their population.

Neonicotinoids are another prime example of how good intention can seriously go wrong. This synthetic chemical
treatment is very effective at killing pests. Neonicotinoids work by damaging the insects’ nervous systems and ultimately killing
them. The chemicals also persist on the pollen of plants, thus finding their way onto keen pollinators like bees, resulting in their
inevitable death. Studies have also shown that even a close proximity to neonicotinoids can disrupt a bee’s ability to navigate and
reproduce. With over one-third of the food we eat depending on bee pollination, many of our crops might never bear fruit and
various ecosystems might collapse if bee populations continue to artificially disappear at such an alarming rate.

Over the years chemists and agricultural scientists have engineered and trialled innumerable chemicals to keep pests at bay – with
some more successful than others. During the same period, modern agriculture has grown more, not less, dependent on pesticides
to keep pace with the ever-expanding population. However, there is a catch, and the price can be prohibitively expensive if we
fail to wean ourselves from them.