The MASTER-project: measures and state-of-the-art techniques for pesticide-laden dust
emission reduction during sowing
FOQUÉ DIETER1* , DEVARREWAERE WOUTER2, VERBOVEN PIETER2, NUYTTENS
DAVID1
1
Institute for Agricultural and Fisheries Research (ILVO), Technology and Food Science Unit, Agricultural Engineering, Burg. van
Gansberghelaan 115, bus 1, 9820 Merelbeke, Belgium
2
KU Leuven, Department Biosystems, MeBioS, De Croylaan 42, 3001 Leuven, Belgium
*dieter.foque@ilvo.vlaanderen.be
The use of seeds dressed with pesticides is widespread and has important advantages. The most important
disadvantage of this technique is that there is a possible emission of pesticide laden dust particles during sowing.
The main factors affecting the emission of pesticide-laden dust are seed treatment quality, the environmental
conditions and the seed drill technology used (Nuyttens et al. 2013).
Due to the bee killing incidents observed in several European countries, the crop protection industry and the
coating and seed technology companies have made important improvements with regard to seed treatment
quality. In several countries, the use of air deflectors on sowing machines was made mandatory. In some cases,
like in Belgium, air deflectors are only required with certain products. Furthermore there is some evidence that
they are not always used in practice. In addition, there are still questions about the efficiency and the optimal
machine settings, the drift reducing effect of deflectors, the effect of environmental and soil conditions, the
relevance of dust drift and its impact, etc. Therefore, a 4 year research project ‘MASTER’ was started end of
2011. An overview and the status of the project will be presented.
The MASTER-project aims at quantifying the risk of dust drift and developing dust drift reducing measures and
innovations in sowing techniques using an integrated experimental and modelling approach. In a first step, the
dust drift potential of several treated seed batches was assessed using the Heubach method and information about
the chemical and physical characteristics of abraded pesticide-coated seed particles was gathered (Foqué et al.
2014). Then the air flow pattern and dust emission of two pneumatic sowing machines, a precision drill
(Gaspardo Stella ST 300) and a bulk drill (Kuhn Venta nc 3000) at different settings, is measured under
controlled conditions. Using this information, a CFD sowing machine model will be developed to simulate the
dust behaviour in and around the machine in order to evaluate the effect of machine design and settings on dust
emission (Devarrewaere et al. 2014). A CFD dust drift emission model will simulate the behaviour of dust in the
environment. Dust drift field experiments will be done to evaluate the effect of machine, seed treatment quality
and environmental conditions on dust drift and to validate the CFD dust drift emission model.
Devarrewaere W, Foqué D, Nuyttens D, Verboven P. 2014. Modelling dust distribution from static pneumatic sowing machines. Aspects of
Applied Biology 121, International Advances in Pesticide 122: 95-102.
Foqué D, Devarrewaere W, Verboven P, Nuyttens D. 2014. Physical and chemical characteristics of abraded seed coating particles. Aspects
of Applied Biology 121, International Advances in Pesticide Application 122: 85-94.
Nuyttens D, Devarrewaere W, Verboven P, Foqué D. 2013. Pesticide-laden dust emission and drift from treated seeds during seed drilling: a
review. Pest Management Science 69:564–575.