Niklas Möhring

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Möhring

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Niklas

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0000-0003-0292-4402

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Publications 1 - 10 of 32

An R package to calculate potential environmental and human health risks from pesticide applications using the ‘Pesticide Load’ indicator applied in Denmark
Möhring, Niklas; Kudsk, Per; Nistrup Jørgensen, Lise; et al. (2021)
Computers and Electronics in Agriculture
This paper presents and discusses the “PesticideLoadIndicator” package, a new R-package to compute potential environmental and health effects of pesticide applications using the Danish ‘Pesticide Load’ indicator. The implementation in the R Statistical Language makes it easy for researchers, practitioners and institutions to compare potential pesticide risks for a wide range of applications and compute risk indicators at field-, crop-, farm-, regional- or national level. The tool is publicly available. It provides a possibility for the direct integration of pesticide properties needed for indicator computation (ecotoxicity, environmental fate and human health), from the Pesticide Properties Database or other sources and allows users to change default reference values and weights.
The adoption of pesticide-free wheat production and farmers' perceptions of its environmental and health effects
Finger, Robert; Möhring, Niklas (2022)
Ecological Economics
The reduction of pesticide use is a prime issue on policy agendas worldwide. However, existing policies often fail to promote widespread adoption of low-pesticide or no-pesticide production practices. Therefore, in order to overcome this obstacle, it is important to understand why farmers hesitate to use more sustainable pest management. To this end, we investigate the relationship between farmers' perception of the adverse environmental and human health effects generated by pesticides and their decision to participate in a novel, pesticide-free wheat production standard in Switzerland. Survey data from 1073 wheat producers reveals that 14% are early adopters of the pesticide-free wheat production program and a further 44% intend to switch to this production scheme in following growing seasons. We find that farmers who perceive risks of pesticides for the environment and human health to be higher are also more likely to adopt pesticide-free production. Our results suggest that a large-scale adoption of pesticide-free production requires a broad set of (policy) instruments beyond purely financial incentives. Our findings thus have important implications for the design of sustainable production schemes.
Improving pesticide-use data for the EU
Mesnage, Robin; Straw, Edward A.; Antoniou, Michael N.; et al. (2021)
Nature Ecology & Evolution
Extreme heat reduces insecticide use under real field conditions
Möhring, Niklas; Finger, Robert; Dalhaus, Tobias (2022)
Science of The Total Environment
Insecticide use and its adverse environmental and health effects are expected to further increase in a warming climate. We here show that farmers' insecticide use, however, declines substantially when facing extreme heat. Using the example of Colorado potato beetles (Leptinotarsa decemlineata) in Switzerland, we find an 11.5% reduction of insecticide use for each day and degree that maximum temperatures exceed 34 °C in the potato growing season. Importantly, our analysis accounts for farmers' behavior under real field conditions, considering the potential adaption of farming practices to extreme heat. It, therefore, highlights how to combine methods to assess and improve our knowledge on the combined major challenges of reducing pesticide risks and coping with the effects of climate change on agriculture while accounting for human behavior. In the analysis, we provide various robustness checks with regard to the definition of temperature extremes, pesticide use indicators, and the chosen statistical model. We further distinguish the principal drivers of the identified effect and find strong evidence that insecticide use reductions are mainly driven by heat-induced decreases in pest pressure rather than heat-induced yield losses that render insecticide applications too expensive. We conclude that similar investigations for other crops and countries are required to assess and understand farmers changing pesticide use decisions under climate change.
Reducing Pesticide Use Risks: An Economic Analysis
Möhring, Niklas (2019)
The reduction of environmental and health risks is on top of the agricultural policy agenda worldwide. The design of effective and efficient policies though is complex. Pesticides are very heterogenous with regards to their properties and usages, pesticide application behaviour of farmers is driven by different deterministic and stochastic determinants, such as environmental conditions, weather and risk preferences and perceptions of farmers – and other agricultural policies like risk management instruments and cross compliance regulations influence farmers application decisions. The goal of this thesis is to inform policymakers on the design and implementation of efficient and effective pesticide policies in order to reduce environmental and health risks from pesticide use. Using economic analysis and quantitative methods, and focusing on the European context, the thesis addresses each of the three major challenges, stated above. As the topics are not independent from each other, the thesis does not only explore each topic separately, but considers important interlinkages. The research reveals three key points for the design of efficient and effective pesticide policies. First, pesticide policies have to account for the fact that pesticides are strongly heterogeneous, with regard to: inherent properties of each pesticide, types of pesticides with different underlying determinants of application, groups of farmers with diverging application behavior and application patterns, leading to different temporal and spatial hotspots of application. The results show that not accounting for this heterogeneity leads in each case to less effective and efficient pesticide policies – and in the worst case to policies having detrimental effects. Second, farmers’ risk preferences and perceptions are an important driver of application behavior of farmers - and farmers’ application behavior, especially economic risks, matter for farmers’ pesticide use decisions. Further, the thesis shows that risk effects of pesticides are different in size and direction, depending on pesticide types and pesticide properties (e.g. low vs. high toxicity). Third, the results of the thesis show that other agricultural policies, apart from pesticide policies, have strong effects on pesticide use: Crop insurances induce changes in pesticide use intensity and land use decisions. Cross compliance regulations incentivize changes in land use and other policy targets like reductions of soil erosion and agricultural energy output conflict with pesticide use reduction targets. In conclusion, efficient and effective pesticide policies should i) address the heterogeneity of pesticides by specifying exact and measurable policy targets and introducing differentiated policies ii) account for differences in application behavior and risk effects and not regard pesticide use decisions as purely deterministic and iii) follow a holistic approach in the agricultural policy framework, i.e. consider potential detrimental effects on pesticide reduction targets whenever new agricultural policies are implemented.
Pfade zu einer ganzheitlichen Pflanzenschutzmittelpolitik
Möhring, Niklas; Finger, Robert (2023)
Umweltrecht in der Praxis
Mit Verboten und einfachen Massnahmen allein lösen wir die Probleme im Pflanzenschutz nicht. Es braucht eine ganzheitliche Pflanzenschutzmittel-Politik. Diese muss messbare, transparente und verbindliche Ziele definieren, um Risiken zu senken und LandwirtInnen Pfade aufzuzeigen, die eine ökologisch, ökonomisch und sozial nachhaltige Umstellung der Produktionssysteme erlauben. Dies geht nur mit Bündeln von Massnahmen: von der Unterstützung diverser Anbau- und alternativer Pflanzenschutzmethoden, neuer Züchtungsmethoden und Digitalisierung bis hin zu verlässlichen ökonomischen Anreizen. Eine ganzheitliche Pflanzenschutzmittel-Politik muss zudem in einen übergeordneten Rahmen einer Ernährungspolitik eingebettet sein.
Innovations for pesticide application must consider environmental impact
Dalhaus, Tobias; Finger, Robert; Tzachor, Asaf; et al. (2024)
Nature Food
Innovation in pesticide application is urgently needed. However, recent approaches, such as employing full-service pesticide contractors or utilizing artificial intelligence for pest control, may prioritize economic and production outcomes over environmental protection and public health. Here, we explore these propositions, their associated risks, and suggest a pathway for sustainable, risk-reduced pesticide decisions.
Herbicide free agriculture? A bio-economic modelling application to Swiss wheat production
Böcker, Thomas; Möhring, Niklas; Finger, Robert (2019)
Agricultural Systems
An economic and environmental assessment of a glyphosate ban for the example of maize production
Böcker, Thomas; Britz, Wolfgang; Möhring, Niklas; et al. (2020)
European Review of Agricultural Economics
We aim to contribute to a more informed discussion of the economic and environmental effects of a glyphosate ban in European agriculture. As real-world observations of weed control under a glyphosate ban are not available, we develop a normative modelling approach based on damage abatement functions considering production risk and farmers’ risk preferences. Different sources of risk are included by incorporating uncertainty of both attainable yield level and weed pressure. Results for a case study of silage maize cultivation in 377 municipalities in North RhineWestphalia, Germany, show that a glyphosate ban causes a shift towards more mechanical weed control, but not to more pronounced use of selective herbicides. The ban slightly reduces net profits and yields, leads to a significant reduction of the overall toxicity of pesticide use, but increases energy consumption of the agricultural system. The magnitude of these effects is found to be critically dependent on output price levels and yield expectations.
Combining ex-ante and ex-post assessments to support the sustainable transformation of agriculture: The case of Swiss pesticide-free wheat production
Möhring, Niklas; Huber, Robert; Finger, Robert (2023)
Q Open
Sustainable intensification of agriculture requires the adoption of new production techniques, tools, and programmes on a large scale. This implies substantial shifts in established ways of farming under uncertain information about potential economic and environmental outcomes. Research can support stakeholders such as farmers, industry, and policy in this transformation by providing evidence-based information. The provision of such information can be improved by combining ex-ante and ex-post assessment tools at different stages of policy cycles and projects. We here present a unique combination of ex-ante bio-economic modelling analysis and ex-post econometric analyses based on survey data using the example of a novel pesticide-free wheat production programme in Switzerland. We exemplify how ex-ante and ex-post evaluation can be combined to increase the robustness of results for stakeholders, e.g. on yield losses from pesticide-free production or farmer typologies important for adoption. Further, we show how their alignment can improve future assessments in project and policy cycles, e.g. through the choice of suitable variables explaining farmer decision-making and priors on the distribution of their characteristics. Despite the identified synergies between assessments, we also find that their integration is limited by the timing and information requirements of stakeholders at different stages in the project. Finally, potential synergies in our case study strongly depended on the type of ex-ante models chosen for evaluation and their alignment with ex-post methods. Especially integrating farmer behaviour in ex-ante assessments seems to be crucial to arriving at holistic evaluations of large-scale programmes for sustainable agricultural practices and providing useful information to stakeholders.

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Niklas Möhring

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