A Brief Insight on Prevalence and Global Perspective of Pesticide

Synthetic pesticides, in most cases, are prepared with a longer shelf life. However, when they are exposed to the environment once, it undergoes degradation via physical, chemical and biological processes. Severe and repeated use of these chemicals has led to the persistence of these pesticides in environment. Water drained from the pesticide treated agricultural lands, wastewater from pesticide industry and soils dumped with pesticide wastes are the major sources of these chemicals into the environment. Less solubility and highly stable structure of majority the pesticide limits their degradation in soil via physico-chemical processes, and their less availability to microbes limits the biochemical degradation process. Biodegradation was further limited by the hypersaline nature of the sample and detraction effects of various metabolic by products on biodegradation of organic chemicals. This book chapter details the basic information about pyrethroid pesticides, their types, production, biodegradation methods and wastewater treatment.