With growing awareness of healthy foods and neighbouring Kerala turning cautious over presence of insecticide residues in vegetables transported from Tamil Nadu, the Agricultural College and Research Institute (ACRI) here is advocating safe pest management techniques to ensure quality, quantity and safety for farmers and users.
About 60 per cent of plant protection is still managed by nature, says M. Kalyanasundaram, Head, Department of Agricultural Entomology, ACRI.
He is concerned about overemphasis on use of chemical pesticides and insecticides. “The popular belief is that pesticide or insecticide is the panacea for all crop diseases. It is not true. It is only a tool, or rather placebo. It does not cure the disease but may aggravate it,” he says.
As consumer awareness is high, people should be supplied with foods that ensure their safety. Hence, farmers should adopt safer pest management techniques. V. Antonisamy, a farmer in Puliyangudi of Tirunelveli district, does not apply any pesticide for mealy bug or ‘maavu poochi’ found in his sugarcane farm. There are native, natural enemies to pests, which act as predators or parasites. The ACRI encourages farmers to use botanical pesticides.
“Only one per cent of the pesticide targets the organism. The rest go into the environment. Who will pay for it,” poses Dr. Kalyanasundaram. He advocates an integrated approach involving botanical pesticides and bio-control agents. Wherever the harvest frequency is less, as in the case of vegetables like brinjal and bhendi, farmers should go for bio-pesticides as chemical pesticides would not work on the pests. A pest with a normal incubation period of 15 days will not be affected by a pesticide sprayed for two days. This will also result in higher presence of pesticide residue.
Agricultural College and Research Institute advocates safe pest management techniques to ensure quality, quantity and safety for farmers and users

Source : The Hindu