Risks versus risks: The professional culture of discretion around pesticide risks

François Dedieu () and Guilhem Anzalone ()
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François Dedieu: Université Paris Est Marne La Vallée
Guilhem Anzalone: Univ. Bretagne Loire

Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies, 2024, vol. 105, issue 4, No 6, 443-464

Abstract: Abstract In France, there have been repeated warnings in recent years about the effects of pesticides on agricultural workers’ health, as well as cases of intoxication. Yet it is still hard to know if farmers are really dangerously exposed to pesticides. The literature on social manufacturing of ignorance focuses either on industries’ strategies to foster doubt or on the role of official tools to examine the risks, and tends to overlook the role of farmers in impeding the production of knowledge. Based on an empirical study of the supply chains of apples and potatoes, and through the lens of the sociology of decision-making, this article seeks to understand how the farmers’ close dependency on pesticides participates in downplaying the toxicity of pesticides. It shows that the practical use of pesticides involves a constant trade-off between legal, economic, and agricultural risks. This leads farmers to develop a culture of secrecy around real pesticide use, in which they hide irregularities. Such open secrecy, shared by a multitude of actors, causes agricultural workers to underestimate the danger of pesticides.

Keywords: Pesticides; Secrecy; Professional culture; Decision-making; Supply chain production (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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DOI: 10.1007/s41130-024-00221-0

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