Agrichemicals are sprayed onto areas to control pests and diseases, or weeds. Occasionally due to weather conditions, the landscape or the operators’ method of application, spray drifts away from the target area. This is known as spraydrift.Spraydrift can occur in two main ways. Primary drift, which is droplet movement off target andsecondary drift, which is the movement of contaminated dust, soil or sand particles and spray vapour.
Agrichemical (or agrochemical), a contraction of agricultural chemical, is a generic term for the various chemical products used in agriculture.
Most agrichemicals are toxic, and all agrichemicals in bulk storage pose significant environmental and/or health risks, particularly in the event of accidental spills.
On farms, proper storage facilities and labelling, emergency clean-up equipment and procedures, and safety equipment and procedures for handling, application and disposal are specific areas of concern, often subject to mandatory standards and regulations.
Agrichemicals are “bad news”, and the New Zealand government has responded to national and international concerns with two pieces of legislation that are intended to achieve agrichemical risk reduction.
Typical agrichemical use performance indicators utilised include; numbers of applications, timing of applications (especially in relation to pest or disease warnings/risk), intervals between applications and the range of different active ingredients used in different spray programmes.
Grower records of agrichemical use are arguably the key source of data on which to base agrichemical use risk assessments and risk reduction strategies.
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