Technical aspects of the application of pesticides and other agricultural inputs are neglected in many countries of the world and often completely unknown at the field level. Huge amounts of pesticides are wasted or unnecessarily applied and large numbers of persons involved in spraying suffer from intoxication because farmers and equipment operators often do not know the principles of application technology and because the equipment they use is obsolete or in bad working condition. An occasional paper titled Agricultural Pesticide Application - Concepts for Improvements is available in English and Spanish in our Publications section. Inadequate application techniques are often the reason why biological products, such as non-chemical alternatives to synthetic pesticides, fail on a commercial scale. FAO is addressing this concern with a Programme for Safe and Efficient Application of Agro-chemicals and Bio-products which includes awareness creation, technical advice and the formulation of Standards for safer and more efficient application equipment and guidelines on the introduction of the respective regulatory framework:
