Skepticism, Science & Pseudoscience

Phytophthora infestans, the fungus-like causal organism of potato blight, can rapidly destroy potato crops and regularly causes significant losses to potato farmers worldwide. To control this disease, growers commonly resort to spraying their crops with fungicides on a near weekly basis.


The susceptible potato variety and the two resistant ones (GMO) were cultivated comparing common practice, with fungicides applied on a weekly basis, and the IPM2.0 method. The research was carried out in the Netherlands and in Ireland, two prominent potato countries, over several years.

The IPM2.0 strategy on the susceptible variety Désirée, resulted in an average reduction of 15% on the fungicide input. Both resistant varieties however remained healthy with an average 80 to 90% reduction of the fungicide input.

The internationally recognised and publicly available Environmental Yardstick for Pesticides was used to quantify the environmental impact. It quantifies the environmental impact of chemical crop protection on water-life, soil-life and groundwater.

Susceptible variety Désirée cultivated under common practice annually received an average of over 700 environmental impact points. Désirée cultivated under IPM2.0 reduced this score to some 400 points.

Both resistant varieties however scored much better under IPM2.0: cultivation of Sarpo Mira received an annual average of only 40 points, while the cisgenic resistant version of Désirée scored even better, less than ten points.

https://www.wur.nl/en/news-wur/Show/More-sustainable-potato-production-through-extended-IPM-for-late-blight.htm