Besides providing food and shelter to natural enemies of crop pests, plants used in conservation biological control interventions potentially provide additional ecosystem services including providing botanical insecticides. Here we concurrently tested the strength of these two services from six non-crop plants in managing cabbage pests in Ghana over three successive field seasons. Crop margin plantings of Ageratum conyzoides, Tridax procumbens, Crotalaria juncea, Cymbopogon citratus, Lantana camara and Talinum triangulare were compared with a bare earth control in a three-way split plot design such that the crop in each plot was sprayed with either a 10% (w/v) aqueous extract from the border plant species, a negative control (water) and a positive control (emamectin benzoate 'Attack' insecticide). Pests were significantly less numerous in all unsprayed treatments with non-crop plant margins and in corresponding sprayed treatments (with botanical or synthetic insecticide positive control) while treatments with bare earth margin or sprayed with water (negative controls) had the highest pest densities. Numbers of predators were significantly depressed by synthetic insecticide but higher in other treatments whether unsprayed or sprayed with botanical insecticide. We conclude that some plant species have utility in both conservation biological control and as source of botanical insecticides that are relatively benign to natural enemies. In this crop system, however, the additional cost associated with using botanical insecticides was not justified by greater levels of pest suppression than achieved from border plants alone. Insect pest attack causes huge crop losses 1 affecting the potential availability of food for over one billion people 2 , and threatening global food security 3. Effective pest management is critical to meeting global food demands 4-6 and synthetic insecticides have been the principal tool in the past six decades 7,8. Even with the introduction of newer and relatively safer insecticides 8 and increased application per unit area and time 9 , crop loss resulting from insect damage has doubled in the past four decades 1,10,11. Indiscriminate and excessive application has led to the elimination of important organisms in the agroecosystem that support crop production 12,13. This is especially prevalent in developing countries including Ghana where farmers and the environment are exposed to high levels of synthetic insecticides, including active ingredients that have been banned in developed nations due to high toxicity and persistence 14. Inadequate provision of important ecosystem services including natural enemy-mediated pest control reinforces reliance on hazardous inputs such as insecticides and threatens agricultural sustainability 15,16. Conservation biological control based on habitat manipulation has been proposed as a sustainable alternative to synthetic insecticides 17. Habitat manipulation involves intentionally establishing plant species at the farm scale or landscape scale to provide conduc...
Global pesticides use is increasing with environmental contamination and consumer concerns over food safety reflecting this trend. A random sampling technique using a structured questionnaire was used to select 108 cabbage farmers in Ghana and were personally interviewed. The study found that most farmers had no formal education or were educated only to primary level so had limited capacity to read and understand labels of pesticides. Whilst biopesticides were popular, about 45% of the growers use synthetic insecticides in controlling pests such as diamondback moth, cabbage aphids, cabbage white butterfly, cabbage web worm and whitefly. Forty-four percent of growers do not adhere to use of the recommended rates of insecticides, because they fail to control pests effectively. Growers with formal education were more likely to adhere to the recommended application rates of pesticides. Respondents with training in agriculture, as opposed to formal education, tended not to adhere to recommended application rates. Overall, seventyseven percent of growers did not wear any personal protective gear during chemical application and 39% had experienced at least a symptom of pesticide poisoning. Over 75% of respondents dispose of empty pesticides containers on the farm and 11% harvest their cabbage within one week after application of insecticides. Results suggest significant risks to farmers, consumers and the environment. It is expected that persistent education on the safe use of pesticides will lead to positive change in attitude of farmers.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.