IPM enables farmers to monitor and control the pests in their fields, keeping the use of expensive and potentially damaging and dangerous chemical pesticides to an absolute minimum. In developing countries, under village conditions, safe use of hazardous pesticides is practically impossible.
Protective clothing is prohibitively expensive, and the tropical heat makes it almost unwearable.
A 1993 study in Indonesia showed that 21 percent of spraying operations resulted in three or more symptoms associated with pesticide poisoning. Eighty-four percent of farmers were also found to be storing chemicals in their homes, in unsafe conditions where children could reach them. Meeting once a week for a 12-week crop season, from transplant to harvest, farmers learn the basic science and the techniques on which successful IPM is based. Their first task is to plant an experimental rice field which will be their classroom. In this field they will study plant health, water management, weather, weed density and disease.