spraying potatoes

[roscoe erf]

B.B.C 2 Horizon last night just said that the average potato crop is sprayed 32 times in a growing season?!
Anyone got any comments?
pretty sure I heard it right I can't remember them being sprayed that much when we grew them

 

[multi power]

32 times seems a lot
Once a week during high risk blight times

 

[David.]

Did anyone challenge it at the time, or is this just more anti conventional farming bullshine reported as fact?
If perhaps somebody told them that potatoes are sprayed every 10 days on average, and an idiotic researcher just did the maths, and deducted bank holidays, it would indeed be about 32 times a year....

 

[HAM135]

Typical BBC crap,even in a bad blight year the sprayer will be in the field 12-14 times max,including weed control and dessication.

 

[D14]

B.B.C 2 Horizon last night just said that the average potato crop is sprayed 32 times in a growing season?!
Anyone got any comments?
pretty sure I heard it right I can't remember them being sprayed that much when we grew them

Utter rubbish and scaremongering. We do 1 sometimes 2 herbicide passes after planting. Then nothing until blight spraying starts which will generally be 10 passes in total. Then desiccation. Even in really wet years like 2012 blight spraying was once every 7 days and looking back at records that meant 18 passes. The lady that made that statement was a vegan so yet again making random statements that are factually incorrect.

 

[youngscot]

I think the most I’ve even been in the one field would be 15 times? But that depends on variety/blight pressure/irrigated crop etc, usually about 8/10 times on average

 

[David.]

Now imagine that a similar slur had been broadcast that was in any way critical of Judaism, the Board of Deputies would have been all over it before bedtime, and the BBC would have been on the rack this morning.
Would that our industry had it's own Board of Deputies.

 

[roscoe erf]

Utter rubbish and scaremongering. We do 1 sometimes 2 herbicide passes after planting. Then nothing until blight spraying starts which will generally be 10 passes in total. Then desiccation. Even in really wet years like 2012 blight spraying was once every 7 days and looking back at records that meant 18 passes. The lady that made that statement was a vegan so yet again making random statements that are factually incorrect.

Did you see it I did hear it right it is available on iPlayer can’t get it on my phone at the moment

 

[Austin7]

Complain to the BBC, My effort attached.

BBC Complaints 
PO Box 1922
 Darlington 
DL3 0UR

To whom it may concern
I wish to complain about the Horizon Program “The Honest Supermarket” shown last night on BBC 2. It was flagrantly dishonest. I have grown potatoes all my working life, for over 60 years, as did my father and grandfather before me. I was incensed by the misrepresentation of potato growers in last night’s program.

The placard "Honest potatoes sprayed 32 times" was repeated in various forms multiple times throughout the programme. Not only is this erroneous it is also making use of subliminal messaging techniques not worthy of the BBC.

Growing Potatoes is not a job for the faint hearted, particularly on our heavy Essex land. During their short 120 day growing period there are any number of things that can go wrong. To give the country the reliable food supply we all expect we do have to use all the tools we are given.

The reason the Potato crop is sprayed more than most is that it has one deadly enemy, Potato Blight. However thankfully that does not mean we are out spraying the crop twice a week as repeatedly suggested last night. We even had irrigators portrayed by implication as pesticide sprayers, please note BBC water is not a pesticide.

Potatoes are the third most important world food crop. Of these critical crops it is the only one that can be 100% lost to one disease as the people of Ireland found in the famine of 1846-9. Today this disease has not lost any of its potency, it is only thanks to modern chemicals that we have been able to keep crops clean of Potato Blight.

Blight is a fungus infection of the leaves of the potato. The chemical control used works on the basis of coating the leaves with a fungicide to protect those leaves, The fungicide does not transmit to the tubers The effectiveness of modern fungicides is there to be seen when by accident the sprayer misses a small part of a field resulting in the loss of the leaves and then the crop as the blight fungi are washed into the soil and then the tubers by either rain or irrigation

The programme made great play on the fact that we use multiple different fungicides and that this posses an additional unknown danger which was not tested for. Again nonsense, we use a range of fungicides to prevent resistance building up thereby reducing the number of applications and rate of fungicide required.

Potatoes are tested by Pesticides Residue in Food (PRIF) who produce a quarterly report. The latest report you will find here

https://assets.publishing.service.g...7/pesticide-residues-quarter3-2018-report.pdf

Modern chemical analysis can detect parts-per-billion concentrations, or even parts-per-trillion ranges, Looking back over these quarterly reports it is clear that at least a half of the crop had no measurable residue and almost 100% is below the level expected by an application at the safe recommended rates ( known as the MRL ). MRL’s are set at least 100 times below what could be considered a health risk. The very few samples that are found to have measurable residues of more than one chemical are carefully assessed for any cumulative issues.

None of the above would take any effort to research yet the BBC chose to portray a wholly false image of the farmers who produce the Great British Potato. There can be no excuse, it was at best lazy programming made even worse by being packaged up as “honest”, the halo over the “o” was the last straw.

What have we farmers done to deserve this ignorant slander from the BBC whose motto is "Inform, educate and entertain", I think not. I am in despair of any rational thought and analysis from the BBC..

 

[david]

Was the program titled 'the honest supermarket' ?

There is no such thing. They are only crooked thieves out trying to screw as much cash out of shoppers as they can get away with. And they shaft their suppliers as hard as they can, for their financial gain.

 

[Exfarmer]

Complain to the BBC, My effort attached.

BBC Complaints 
PO Box 1922
 Darlington 
DL3 0UR

To whom it may concern
I wish to complain about the Horizon Program “The Honest Supermarket” shown last night on BBC 2. It was flagrantly dishonest. I have grown potatoes all my working life, for over 60 years, as did my father and grandfather before me. I was incensed by the misrepresentation of potato growers in last night’s program.

The placard "Honest potatoes sprayed 32 times" was repeated in various forms multiple times throughout the programme. Not only is this erroneous it is also making use of subliminal messaging techniques not worthy of the BBC.

Growing Potatoes is not a job for the faint hearted, particularly on our heavy Essex land. During their short 120 day growing period there are any number of things that can go wrong. To give the country the reliable food supply we all expect we do have to use all the tools we are given.

The reason the Potato crop is sprayed more than most is that it has one deadly enemy, Potato Blight. However thankfully that does not mean we are out spraying the crop twice a week as repeatedly suggested last night. We even had irrigators portrayed by implication as pesticide sprayers, please note BBC water is not a pesticide.

Potatoes are the third most important world food crop. Of these critical crops it is the only one that can be 100% lost to one disease as the people of Ireland found in the famine of 1846-9. Today this disease has not lost any of its potency, it is only thanks to modern chemicals that we have been able to keep crops clean of Potato Blight.

Blight is a fungus infection of the leaves of the potato. The chemical control used works on the basis of coating the leaves with a fungicide to protect those leaves, The fungicide does not transmit to the tubers The effectiveness of modern fungicides is there to be seen when by accident the sprayer misses a small part of a field resulting in the loss of the leaves and then the crop as the blight fungi are washed into the soil and then the tubers by either rain or irrigation

The programme made great play on the fact that we use multiple different fungicides and that this posses an additional unknown danger which was not tested for. Again nonsense, we use a range of fungicides to prevent resistance building up thereby reducing the number of applications and rate of fungicide required.

Potatoes are tested by Pesticides Residue in Food (PRIF) who produce a quarterly report. The latest report you will find here

https://assets.publishing.service.g...7/pesticide-residues-quarter3-2018-report.pdf

Modern chemical analysis can detect parts-per-billion concentrations, or even parts-per-trillion ranges, Looking back over these quarterly reports it is clear that at least a half of the crop had no measurable residue and almost 100% is below the level expected by an application at the safe recommended rates ( known as the MRL ). MRL’s are set at least 100 times below what could be considered a health risk. The very few samples that are found to have measurable residues of more than one chemical are carefully assessed for any cumulative issues.

None of the above would take any effort to research yet the BBC chose to portray a wholly false image of the farmers who produce the Great British Potato. There can be no excuse, it was at best lazy programming made even worse by being packaged up as “honest”, the halo over the “o” was the last straw.

What have we farmers done to deserve this ignorant slander from the BBC whose motto is "Inform, educate and entertain", I think not. I am in despair of any rational thought and analysis from the BBC..

Well said!

 

[devonshire farmer]

Complain to the BBC, My effort attached.

BBC Complaints 
PO Box 1922
 Darlington 
DL3 0UR

To whom it may concern
I wish to complain about the Horizon Program “The Honest Supermarket” shown last night on BBC 2. It was flagrantly dishonest. I have grown potatoes all my working life, for over 60 years, as did my father and grandfather before me. I was incensed by the misrepresentation of potato growers in last night’s program.

The placard "Honest potatoes sprayed 32 times" was repeated in various forms multiple times throughout the programme. Not only is this erroneous it is also making use of subliminal messaging techniques not worthy of the BBC.

Growing Potatoes is not a job for the faint hearted, particularly on our heavy Essex land. During their short 120 day growing period there are any number of things that can go wrong. To give the country the reliable food supply we all expect we do have to use all the tools we are given.

The reason the Potato crop is sprayed more than most is that it has one deadly enemy, Potato Blight. However thankfully that does not mean we are out spraying the crop twice a week as repeatedly suggested last night. We even had irrigators portrayed by implication as pesticide sprayers, please note BBC water is not a pesticide.

Potatoes are the third most important world food crop. Of these critical crops it is the only one that can be 100% lost to one disease as the people of Ireland found in the famine of 1846-9. Today this disease has not lost any of its potency, it is only thanks to modern chemicals that we have been able to keep crops clean of Potato Blight.

Blight is a fungus infection of the leaves of the potato. The chemical control used works on the basis of coating the leaves with a fungicide to protect those leaves, The fungicide does not transmit to the tubers The effectiveness of modern fungicides is there to be seen when by accident the sprayer misses a small part of a field resulting in the loss of the leaves and then the crop as the blight fungi are washed into the soil and then the tubers by either rain or irrigation

The programme made great play on the fact that we use multiple different fungicides and that this posses an additional unknown danger which was not tested for. Again nonsense, we use a range of fungicides to prevent resistance building up thereby reducing the number of applications and rate of fungicide required.

Potatoes are tested by Pesticides Residue in Food (PRIF) who produce a quarterly report. The latest report you will find here

https://assets.publishing.service.g...7/pesticide-residues-quarter3-2018-report.pdf

Modern chemical analysis can detect parts-per-billion concentrations, or even parts-per-trillion ranges, Looking back over these quarterly reports it is clear that at least a half of the crop had no measurable residue and almost 100% is below the level expected by an application at the safe recommended rates ( known as the MRL ). MRL’s are set at least 100 times below what could be considered a health risk. The very few samples that are found to have measurable residues of more than one chemical are carefully assessed for any cumulative issues.

None of the above would take any effort to research yet the BBC chose to portray a wholly false image of the farmers who produce the Great British Potato. There can be no excuse, it was at best lazy programming made even worse by being packaged up as “honest”, the halo over the “o” was the last straw.

What have we farmers done to deserve this ignorant slander from the BBC whose motto is "Inform, educate and entertain", I think not. I am in despair of any rational thought and analysis from the BBC..

Couldn’t of put it better myself, imagine the cost of 32passes, would sure put pay to any chance of a profit!!!!!!

 

[david]

Although a crop of potatoes may receive 12-14 applications of plant protection products during a growing season, the actual number of active ingredients may be closer to 32 as quoted by BBC.

I believe that plant protection surveys/data collection operate as such - and this is how the BBC may have arrived at this figure from plant protection surveys/data gathering -

A - tuber treatments on the seed potato - imazalil, Rhino, Maxim, Monceren or Emesto ?
B - Glyphosate off any weeds before land prep ?
C - Azoxystrobin or Allstar applied during planting ? Slug pellets ? Nematicide to control PCN or FLN - Velum, Vydate, Nemathorin or Mocap ?
D - weed control which could include diquat, pyraflufen, carfentazone, metribuzin, aclonifen, pendimethalin, flufencet, prosulfocarb, clomazone, metrobromuron (but most likely a combination of several of these)
E - aphid control - pymetrozine, thiacloprid, acetamiprid, flonicamid
F - cut worm and sliver y moth caterpillars - likely lambda cyhalothrin
G - blight control - numerous rounds of mancozeb, chlorothalonil, fluazinam, propamocarb hydrochloride, cyazofamid, amisulbrom, fluopicolide, oxathiapiprolin, cymoxanil, mandipropamide, dimethomorph, benthiavalicarb, zoxamide
H - Alternaria control - mancozeb, azoxystrobin, boscalid, pyraclostrobin, difenoconazole
I - sprouting control - maleaic hydrazide
J - Desiccation - diquat, pyraflufen, carfentrazone

 

[Austin7]

David has produced a helpful excuse sheet for the BBC and indeed I have already directed them towards them to PRIF Potato testing which looked for 367 different actives. Interesting but not to the point.

For those that did not watch the BBC’s “Honest Supermarket” a sequence showing potato harvesting followed by irrigation the voice over saying” Modern food production means that there are somethings in our food almost impossible to avoid” then a placard proclaiming “potatoes sprayed 32 times” with a customer quite naturally saying that he would think again about buying them and another saying “at least they are honest about it.” Then followed an interview with the “Pesticide Action Network” who said that “pesticide use is rising, in 1990 the average Uk potato crop was sprayed 12 times in one growing season by 2016 it had gone up to 32 times.” The issue of “so called chemical cocktails” which David has alluded to was cited as an additional but separate issue. The Pesticide Action Network maintained it was not being considered, the HSE DEFRA quarterly PRIF reports say otherwise. David may be happy with the picture painted by the BBC of Uk potato production, I beg to differ.

 

[D14]

Did you see it I did hear it right it is available on iPlayer can’t get it on my phone at the moment

Yes I watched it. Hyped up scaremongering about the number of times a crop is sprayed. However I think they have a valid point about the amount of pesticides found on food. Individually the levels of each chemical are under the thresholds but collectively the lab tests have affected the hormones of male rats. To be honest we generally always try to buy organic in this house but we are not an organic farm.

 

[farmerm]

Yes I watched it. Hyped up scaremongering about the number of times a crop is sprayed. However I think they have a valid point about the amount of pesticides found on food. Individually the levels of each chemical are under the thresholds but collectively the lab tests have affected the hormones of male rats. To be honest we generally always try to buy organic in this house but we are not an organic farm.

Not to devalue the need for pesticides to be safe to use and to be used safely, but let us also not forget many, if not all plants we consume contain plenty of harmful chemicals that are either naturally produced by the plant or by pathogens that live in or on them... Globally humans suffer more harm from having insufficient access to food than from consuming sufficient quantities of food with traces of pesticides.

If you want to affect the hormone activity of male rates you only have to fill their drink feeders with tap water. Tap water has increasingly high levels of oestrogen, which is present in no small part due to the widespread (and necessary) use of the female contraceptive pill. Cocaine use is now also so widespread its metabolised product benzoylecgonine can be detected in drinking water. Traces of many other pharmaceuticals have also be detected, everything from antibiotics to anti-depressants.

Humans have at the chemical level changed our environment more in the last 50 years than the previous 5000

 

[Oat]

I haven't seen the programme yet, but I heard that the agronomist Sean Sparling was interviewed, but although he refuted most of the incorrect facts and options, much of what he said did not reach the final edit

 

[stroller]

I wonder how many of the BBC execs who are horrified at the spraying of potatoes are quite happy ingesting large quantities of recreational chemicals?