Received: 13-12-2013 / Accepted: 20-02-2014
Pesticide risks in terms of hazard and exposure are expected to reduce through community based farmer training. With this regards, a community based training program on pesticide risk reduction (PRR) has been implemented in Vietnam since 2007. With two data sets on 94 pesticide users before and after PRR training in PRR and control communes of Hanoi city and Thai Binh province, this paper shows that: The program has improved farmers’ awareness/knowledge and their behaviors in PRR, and enabled farmers to reduce hazards and exposure. Farmers used pesticides permited for vegetables, used more biopesticides and class III and IV pesticides. On the exposure side, positive impacts were more proper pesticide use techniques; use of more protective equipment and better unused pesticides and sprayer management. As a result, the environmental impact quotients were reduced sharply from 20% to 78%.