Fighting back with IPM
This issue is about substituting external inputs for labour, management skills and knowledge. It is about Integrated Pest Management (IPM) and men and women farmers participating in Farmer Field Schools, experiential learning and non-formal education.
Table of contents:
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4 - 5written by ILEIA editorial teamThis issue of the Newsletter is about substituting external inputs for labour, management skills and knowledge. It is about Integrated Pest Management (IPM) and men and women farmers participating in Farmer Field Schools, experiential learning and non-formal education.
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6 - 7written by Angela Maria Burgos Herrera , Heiber Yovanny Armero Zambrano , Juan Martinez , Miguel A. AltieriPrevailing economic policies in Latin America encourage the production of export and/or commercial crops, primarily in large-scale monocultures. Pesticide expenditures in the Latin American region increased from US$1.0 billion in 1980 to US$2.7 billion in 1990. The major recipients of pesticides were large-scale production systems producing sugar cane, cotton, maize, soybeans, rice, citrus and tomatoes, especially in Brazil, Colombia, Argentina and Mexico. Predictably, the emphasis of the chemical-intensive agricultural export model has intensified ecologically-based crisis conditions and has lead to serious environmental and health consequences.
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8 - 9written by Peter KenmoreIPM continues to evolve through the hands, minds, and courage of farming communities in Asia and Africa. These communities gain agro-economic benefits, suffer fewer hazards to human health, better and more sustainably manage their locally varying natural resources, and exercise greater science-based power to hold outside bureaucracies accountable. Community IPM, which usually builds on Farmers Field Schools, retains the responsiveness of many good NGO initiatives but reaches the scale of spread demanded by most governments. Partnerships and conflicts among communities, technical agencies, governments, funding agencies, and international bodies influence the evolution of IPM. (ILEIA)
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10 - 11written by Gaby StollDuring the 1990s, there have been new awarenesses and developments in crop protection. There have been improvements in user, consumer and environmental protection at the product development level and in the approaches adopted. When we analyse the relevance of these improvements for small farmers in developing countries, however, it becomes clear that there is still a lack of progress in making the new crop protection practices available to them. (ILEIA)
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12 - 13written by Sam PageThe Zimbabwean Eco-lab has an innovative way of tackling farmer participatory training in pest management. ZIP Research operates from the ECO-lab and is concerned with identifying common pests and training Farmer Field Workers (FFWs).
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14 - 15written by Margaret S. ManganThe farmer training approach discussed here is FFS. The field schools run in the Chinese case study examined here involved some 25 farmers who met together each week. Training took place in a rice field, and in this supportive learning environment local ecology and practices were discussed and the farmers perceptions of their farm agro-ecosystems were developed further. This process of observation is known as agro-ecosystem analysis and the outcome of the farmers' weekly agro-ecosystem analysis became the basis of such decision making as whether or not to continue relying on spiders and parasitic wasps to control rice pests. (ILEIA)
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16 - 16Pemba is characterised by two rainy seasons. Cassava is the staple food although rice, grown twice a year under irrigation, is preferred. In the 1980s to reduce dependence on imported rice, the Ministry of Agriculture introduced irrigation schemes for resource poor farmers. Local rice variety yields were low under rainfed conditions but showed tolerance to prevailing pests and diseases. Irrigated rice yields were not much better, however, because of low soil fertility, water management problems and such pests and diseases as Hispa (Trichispa sericea), Rice Yellow Mottle Virus (RYMV) and stem borers.
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17 - 17written by Pham Cong PhinDuck raising has a long history in Vietnam. The rice-duck system was first tested in 1994. A more detailed version of the article here presented in available on request.
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17 - 17written by M.A. QaiumThe Red Hairy Caterpillar, or Amsata albistriga, is a voracious polyphagous pest attacking many rainfed crops in low rainfall areas. A more detailed version of this article is available upon request.
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18 - 19written by Monica Moore , Peter RossetUntil recently, Cuban agricultural production was based almost entirely on the conventional industrialised model characterised by a strong dependence on synthetic pesticides and fertilisers, fossil fuels and other Green Revolution inputs. With the collapse of the socialist trading block in 1989, however, the country\'s access to the pesticides and other inputs it had relied on vanished almost overnight.
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20 - 21written by Nguyen Nhat TuyenThis article discusses the role of women in agriculture in Vietnam and focuses on the participation of women farmers in IPM Farmer Field Schools (FFS). The article is based on the findings of a study Women and IPM in Vietnam carried out in 1994 by the Hanoi- based Centre for Family and Women Studies on behalf of the FAO. (ILEIA)
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22 - 23written by Rik ThijssenPyrethrins are a group of economically very important natural plant insecticides and closely resemble chemical compounds present in many plant members of the family Compositae, the family of the sunflower. These compounds are derived from the dried flowers of the pyrethrum daisy, Chrysanthemum cinerariaefolium (Fam. Compositae).
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24 - 25As part of the Kenya Woodfuel and Agroforestry Programme (KWAP) farmers in Western Kenya are taking part in an on-farm experiment in pest control. In keeping with the participatory approach, farmers identified the major insect pests in their area. A number of local, wild shrubs were selected and used to prepare insecticides. Tithonia turned out to be a very effective multi-purpose shrub. (ILEIA)
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26 - 27written by Huub A.I. StoetzerCourses transfer more than information. They provide examples of how information can be communicated in the learning situation. Participants in an international IPM refreshing course were introduced to Non-Formal Education (NFE) in the hope that they would use this method to train IPM extension workers in their own countries. (ILEIA)
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28 - 29There is growing concern in Africa about the dramatic rise in the use of pesticides by small-scale farmers. Cases of acute poisoning and problems with pesticide residues in local and export produce attract growing attention. Smallholders in the East African highlands grow cash crops such as coffee in a mixed cropping systems that includes vegetables. Pesticides are increasingly being used on a calendar basis. The cost of agrochemicals is a heavy drain on the farmers\' income and sometimes pesticides destined for coffee are used for vegetables and other food crops. This puts human health at risk. Although alternative pest and disease control options exist, there is very little information on IPM and integrated crop management (ICM) available to this group of farmers. NGOs are often more concerned with promoting organic farming and focus on kitchen gardens and subsistence crops. (ILEIA)
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30 - 30written by Sarojeni V. RengamIn 1995, a PAN Asia and the Pacific study of women and pesticides, through interviews with more than 2,500 farmers and workers, most of whom were women, showed that most women farmers and workers spray pesticides or come in direct contact with pesticides in their work. (ILEIA)
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31 - 31The potato is of fundamental importance in the diet and economy of the farmer in the Bolivian Andes. Usually this crop is either grown in rain-fed conditions above 4000 meters or under irrigation in the valleys where the altitude varies from 2500m to 800m. The Andean potato weevil - various species of the genus Premnotrypes - is the main pest at higher altitudes. The adult female lays her eggs at the base of the potato plant. The hatching larvae move through the soil and feed on the tubers formed underground. At harvesting time, the larvae leave the tubers and enter the soil forming pupae and later as adults they invade recently planted potato fields. The weevil produces one generation each year a process well synchronised with the potato crop. (ILEIA)
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36 - 36written by Marielle DubbelingExperiments in Peru on controlling late blight (Phytophthora infestans - one of the main problems in potato cultivation all over the world), and in the control of the potato moth (Phthorimaea operculella), a pest which generally attacks the crop during storage.
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