On the basis of standard protection programs defined by crop protection experts, a fixed pesticide use intensityis estimated for 19 annual and perennial crops representing 90% of French arable land area and thebulk of pesticide use in French agriculture. These coefficients, combined with national agricultural landuse statistics, are used to construct an artificial index of pesticide use in France whose variations dependsolely on changes in agricultural land use. This index is calculated over the period 1989–2013