Safe and affordable pest management

Effective pest management and environmental safety are not easy to achieve where farm budgets are low. Participants at a Symposium in Kenya entitled 'Community-based and Environmentally Safe Pest Management' were warned that the high development and manufacturing costs of environmentally-safe pesticides may put them beyond the reach of most developing countries. Reassuringly, they were also told of work that held out the prospect of reaching a satisfactory compromise between effectiveness and environmental safety. The purpose of the symposium, which was organized by the International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (ICIPE), was to explore the common components and the underlying concepts behind community based pest management. Eight topics were addressed by the Symposium: they were selected because of the significant contribution ICIPE has made to each of them. After reviewing the techniques available for pest management strategies the role of insect population dynamics was examined in the context of such strategies. The contributions of chemical ecology, behavioural and physiological studies were also considered. Community-based vector management strategies were reviewed, with reference to tse-tse fly, ticks, sand flies and mosquitoes. Following discussions on crop pest management participants examined the socio-economic aspects of the interface between pest management, technology and rural communities. The meeting concluded by examining pest management in relation to human safety and the role of networking in pest management and the development of human resources. Whilst many speakers' contributions inevitably tended to focus on specific pest problems in particular crops, all accepted that in reality agricultural production systems in the Tropics are highly complex. Besides cultivating a wide range of economically important plants, farmers in tropical countries must contend with an enormous diversity of pests and diseases. The research worker, who can often afford to focus his interests on a specific ...