Produced by the International Association for the Plant Protection Sciences (IAPPS). To join IAPPS and receive the Crop Protection journal online go to: www.plantprotection.org
Open Forum on Agricultural bio-technology, Nigeria (OFAB), an International Organisation, has urged Nigerians to embrace bio-technology to mitigate issues around climate change and ensure food security in the country.
Dr Rose Gidado, Country Director, OFAB Nigeria, said this at the sideline of the science hangout, organised by the Alliance for Science Nigeria (ASN) on Monday in Abuja.
She said the meeting was to discuss “the status of genetically modified food” and how best to deploy bio-technology to ensure food security in Nigeria.
Gidado explained that conventional Agriculture might be failing due to a lot of reasons related to climate change, including incessant high rise in temperature, gully erosion and desert encroachment.
“Also, we have other environmental reasons why conventional agriculture is failing; the oil spillage, insecurities on our farms and a lot more.
“Bio-technology has been adopted in Nigeria, a seed launch was held last year in Kano and farmers are testifying to greater yields and one of the economic benefits is 20 per cent yields increase per hectare.
“With the use of this technology, we are saving Nigeria N16 billion, which is normally used to import cowpeas; these crops undergo rigorous testing, making them safer for consumption compared to organic crops,” she added.
According to her, what makes genetic modification unique is its flexibility to adopt desired genes from donor plants and input into a crop aimed at improving given best desired results and helping also with resistance in certain crops.
Also, Prof. Hamzat Lawal, , Follow The Money, said that although GM- crops were facing issues around conspiracy theories, there were data and evidences to show that the technologies were straightforward science.
“Six million people in Nigeria go to bed hungry on a daily basis; the issue of food insecurity is at a critical stage globally.
“That’s why the bio-technology innovation is here to stay; it is an intervention that will save us from food shortage in the country.
“Until now, there were debates around climate change too; people will naturally reject what they don’t know because there is no trust yet which is only expected.
“The best we can do is to educate the public and carry out more sensitisation on this technology that will change a lot of things and ensure we eat safer food,” he added.
Ben Sikes of the University of Kansas discovered biosecurity measures cut spread of fungal pathogens over a national border. Here, Sikes examines Picipes badius, the black-footed polypore that causes white rot on trees. Credit: University of Kansas
A major new study appearing in PLOS Biology on May 31 examines more than a century of fungal pathogens, finding well-aimed biosecurity measures cut the spread of unwanted fungi into a nation, even in the face of increased globalized trade.
“Although trade is closely tied to the number of new invasions we have from fungal pathogens, if we have targeted biosecurity we can start to break down this link,” said lead author Benjamin Sikes, assistant professor of ecology & evolutionary biology at the University of Kansas and assistant scientist at the Kansas Biological Survey. “Because globalization and imports to and from other countries are just going to keep increasing, most data have shown with that come lots of new invasive species around the world. The question is, can you slow that? This work shows that link can be slowed with implementation of targeted biosecurity measures.”
Sikes, a microbial ecologist whose research focuses on soil fungi, analyzed a New Zealand database of plant pathogens and diseases going back to the 19th century as part of a collaborative project among KU, New Zealand’s Bio-Protection Research Centre and Manaaki Whenua-Landcare Research.
“There’s a huge number of ways people can bring plant pathogens into New Zealand or a country like the United States,” he said. “Many are brought in with agricultural imports. People bring in seeds or plant materials—even soils or lumber can have pathogens that were on those plants to begin with or are in those materials once they bring them through. If they’re not screened properly, these pathogens can establish and start to spread to local crops and plant species.”
The term “biosecurity” is a “really big umbrella” that has evolved over the years reviewed in the new study, according to Sikes. The research focused primarily on the consequences of border surveillance, phytosanitary inspections and quarantine for incoming plant diseases.
“At ports of entry there are border-inspection people, like our USDA,” he said. “If they’re getting in a shipment of bananas to the U.S. from Costa Rica, there would be a person inspecting it, looking for visible symptoms and spot testing for the most prolific diseases from source countries. They might also have quarantine periods, where imports need to be held for a set amount of time to ensure they are pest-free.”
The consequences of invading pathogens are “massive” around the world and can include economic as well as ecological effects, according to the KU researcher.
“For fungal pathogens that we were looking at, they cause heavy losses economically for crops every year, into the billions of dollars and perhaps as much as 20 percent of yields,” said Sikes. “Even for an agricultural state like Kansas, my guess is that it would be hundreds of millions of dollars in most years. The pathogens are not all imported; some are localized. Imported pathogens, though, can also be a problem for native ecology. Chestnut blight is a great example that decimated chestnut trees in the eastern U.S.—it was a fungal blight from Asia. It changed how people see the forest. People in the eastern U.S. who lived the early 1900s wouldn’t recognize the forest today, because one in every three trees was a chestnut tree.”
Sikes and colleagues used data from New Zealand, which spends 0.3 percent of its gross domestic product on biosecurity measures, to assess whether the country’s program has been effective in slowing the introduction and spread of fungal plant pathogens. Sikes said New Zealand was a unique case because many of their crop plants are not native to the country.
University of Kansas scientist Ben Sikes found biosecurity measures were effective in keeping unwanted plant pathogens out of New Zealand. Credit: University of Kansas
“Because all of these crops in New Zealand aren’t originally from there, almost all the bad diseases are not from there as well, so can be imported as well,” he said. “The danger from imported pathogens is about the highest it could be in New Zealand. Whereas in a large continent like here in the U.S. or in Asia, dangers from existing pathogens may be a lot higher.”
Drawing from a database of all known plant-pathogen associations in New Zealand going back to 1880, the researchers determined the rate at which new fungal pathogens arrived and became established on 131 economically important plant species over the last 133 years.
“We had this ability in New Zealand because of the records that were there and because it’s a relatively young country,” said Sikes. “They’re a world leader in biosecurity, and it’s important for them to know if those measures are working and worth spending money on.”
The researchers found as trade between nations all over the world, including New Zealand, became more globalized, the number of pathogens introduced into the country rose in direct proportion. However, pathogens started to level off in particular industries like crops after New Zealand implemented specific biosecurity measures to target pathways for those pathogens.
“We see an exponential increase over time in the number of bad things that get introduced,” Sikes said. “But around the 1980s, if we look at all the plants at once, that rate starts to slow. Fewer new things are coming in. When you drill into why that is, it’s caused by two counteracting trends between industries. For crops and pasture species familiar to us here in Kansas—like corn and wheat—they started slowing down in the number of pathogens they were getting back in the ’60s and ’70s. This timing is about a decade after they instituted important biosecurity measures like looking at seeds to make sure they were pathogen- and pest-free and creating a USDA equivalent to go out and survey crops. This timing coincides with the slowdown in new pathogens coming in.”
By contrast, Sikes said other primary industries in New Zealand that lacked targeted biosecurity saw increasing rates of new pathogens.
“Forestry and fruit trees continue to have many new pathogens each year, and that’s still accelerating—their patterns go right along with the acceleration in trade,” said the KU researcher.
As part of the work, Sikes and his colleagues modeled both the arrival of new pathogens and the nation’s rate of detection. From these, the team was able to predict how many pathogens are present but remain undetected in a country like New Zealand.
“For the first time, we can quantify how fast these things are coming into a country, and that’s actually super hard to do,” Sikes said. “Given the amount of investment the U.S. or, say, Germany is making in biosecurity, we now can say, ‘You’ve found this number of things, and you looked this many times—and based on what we know, this is about how many things you would find if you were able to find them all.”
A newly developed technique can predict the risk of plant disease or infestation across the globe. Described in open-access journal Frontiers in Applied Mathematics and Statistics, the technique considers pest-host interactions and the geographical distribution of vulnerable plants to provide maps of potential disease hotspots. This could help governments to understand the risk of outbreaks before they happen.
Diseases and pests can have a devastating impact on plants, the surrounding ecosystem, and food supplies. These effects can be particularly damaging when a pest or pathogen invades a new territory, in which native plants have little natural resistance and the destructive invader has few native predators or competitors.
Government agencies try to restrict pests and pathogens by controlling the movement of plants and animals between countries and regions. However, with international trade and travel, it can be difficult or impossible to stop pests and pathogens from spreading.
One way to get a head start in preventing infection and infestation outbreaks is to analyze where known pests and pathogens are currently located, and then look at the distribution of plants that might be vulnerable to attack. However this type of in-depth analysis can be time-consuming, given the huge array of plant, pathogen and pest species.
To better help predict outbreaks, researchers in Mexico developed a new series of algorithms to help predict outbreaks. Their technique is based on the principle that closely related plants that grow near each other are prone to infection or infestation by the same pathogens or pests. By studying the geographical distribution of closely related plants, the research team generated maps of potential disease hotspots.
To test their algorithms, the team applied them to an invasive pest present in North America, the redbay ambrosia beetle. This invasive beetle transmits Laurel Wilt Disease, which can be deadly for plants of the laurel family. The researchers consulted online databases to find a group of ambrosia beetles that are closely related to the redbay ambrosia beetle, and a group of plant species that are associated with these beetles.
Using known beetle/plant interactions as a starting point, and then using their algorithms to estimate the probability that closely related plants would be similarly impacted, the researchers calculated the probability of each plant being affected by a particular beetle species.
The team then incorporated data about the known geographical distribution of each plant. If plants are found over large areas, then they are at higher risk for contracting and spreading an outbreak. Using their algorithms, the researchers calculated the probability of multiple plant species being infested by a beetle when the plants are present at the same site.
Using the technique, the team created maps showing regions of the world most likely to suffer infestation, or interaction between the beetles and plants. The maps accurately reflected the native territories of the beetles, along with the recent invasive behavior of some beetles, including the southward advance of one beetle across the United States. Worryingly, the model indicated that similar plants in Central and South America could be vulnerable to invasion next.
These types of maps could be very helpful for government agencies and ecologists in understanding and predicting outbreaks, by highlighting current or potential disease hotspots, but the team need further data from fieldwork to check the system’s accuracy.
However, these algorithms are not just applicable to plant infestations. “The method provides easy-to-use computer tools, which can be applied to understand and predict interactions between any group of organisms,” says Andrés Lira-Noriega, a researcher involved in the study.
Disclaimer: AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert system.
Development projects that aim to improve agricultural production often have 30,000 or more farmers. It’s no surprise that when you truly target the poor, it’s often hard to reach them. You might have to arrive in an all-terrain vehicle or walk over streams. It might take an hour or more if the farmer’s field is inaccessible by motor vehicle. Maybe you have to take a donkey, as the terrain is too steep to walk easily. These are common scenarios when truly targeting the most marginalized.
Photo: Field monitors evaluating cashew farms in Benin. Credit: CRS and NetHope staff.
A single field agent can have 50 or more farmers in such hard-to-reach places. This agent trains others on various new agriculture management practices, manages demonstration plots, delivers improved varieties of plants and conducts regular monitoring among other activities. It makes sense that, to save time and money, field agents often meet with farmers in one location and conduct project activities as a group. This can also improve the adoption rate of new practices, but that is difficult to monitor without walking each famer’s field, no matter how remote or hard to reach.
Sometimes even that isn’t enough. Take Bossou Antoinette’s cashew farm that she sharecrops in Benin. Monitoring projects usually means asking farmers if they have tried the new management practices. But this practice only measures the farmer’s perception — not the reality in the farmers’ fields or the challenges faced there. Maybe in a corner of Bossou Antoinette’s farm there are invasive weeds that keep coming back, and she gave up on that corner because nothing seems to work permanently, and the work is difficult. Perhaps she may not mention that to a project monitor. When asked, she could simply answer, “Weeding is one of my biggest problems. Cutting is a lot of work.”
Photo: Bossou Antoinette is a cashew farmer with six children. Credit: CRS and NetHope staff.
That’s what she told me about the farm she sharecrops. We count this as a success because she tried weeding, so that box is checked. This doesn’t mean that such monitoring is bad, it just means it is subject to such human error, and we can’t always go to every corner of every farm to confirm these reports.
Technology can help. Many studies show that using images or pictures provides a more accurate measure of field conditions than even highly trained agriculture practitioners on the ground. Until recently, such high resolution imagery came from satellites and was out of the reach of many development programs because of cost and cloud cover. Now, however, the low cost of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), which can fly below clouds, means that development programs can increasingly access high-resolution imagery.
Photo: UAV operator Jacob Petersen from Danoffice IT shows CRS staff Thierry Yabi (on his left) and cashew farmers how to fly a UAV. Credit: CRS and NetHope staff.
So far UAVs have been mainly used in emergencies. But last week CRS, in collaboration with NetHope, flew a UAV over cashew farms in central Benin. The images told us immediately that there was a need to thin out trees in some places. We could see where there is space available to plant more trees and how many could be planted, where there had been burning, and identify areas for follow-up due to invasive weeds or other problems. This is just from a first look at the image. Further analysis might tell us even more. With this information, the field agent can use his or her limited and expensive time to pinpoint areas that require an in-person visit.
Photo: UAV preparing to land. Credit: CRS and NetHope staff.
This imagery can even tell us where about a corner of Bassou Antoinette’s farm that has a weeding problem, one that we did not see even though we walked the boundary of her plot.
Research findings should reduce trade barriers and boost pest control measures
28 October 2014, Rome/Vienna – Four of the world’s most destructive agricultural pests are actually one and the same fruit fly, according to the results of a global research effort released today. The discovery should lead to the easing of certain international trade restrictions and also aid efforts to combat the ability of these harmful insects to reproduce, experts said.
The so-called Oriental, Philippine, Invasive and Asian Papaya fruit flies, the study shows, all belong to the same biological species, Bactrocera dorsalis, which is causing incalculable damage to horticultural industries and food security across Asia, Africa, and the Pacific.
The international collaborative effort, involving close to 50 researchers from 20 countries, began in 2009 and was coordinated by FAO and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). It followed an integrative approach, examining evidence across a range of disciplines.
The ability to precisely identify pests is central to pest management, including quarantine measures or bans applied to internationally traded food and agriculture products such as fruit and vegetables.
Keeping exotic fruit flies out is a major concern for many countries. The study’s findings mean that trade restrictions linked to the Oriental fruit fly should now fall away in cases where the insect is present in both the importing and exporting country, according to Jorge Hendrichs from the Joint FAO/IAEA Division of Nuclear Techniques in Food and Agriculture in Vienna.
“This outcome has major implications for global plant biosecurity, especially for developing countries in Africa and Asia,” said the study’s lead author, Mark Schutze, from the Plant Biosecurity Cooperative Research Centre (PBCRC) and the Queensland University of Technology (QUT).
“For example, the Invasive –now Oriental — fruit fly has devastated African fruit production with crop losses exceeding 80 percent and has led to widespread trade restrictions with refusal of shipments of products into Asia, Europe and Japan, and significant economic and social impacts on farming communities,” Schutze added.
Using sterilized males to mate with wild females
The findings of the study will also simplify techniques like the use of sterilized males to prevent the growth of pest populations.
A form of insect birth control, the sterile insect technique involves releasing mass-bred male flies that have been sterilized by low doses of radiation into infested areas, where they mate with wild females. These do not produce offspring and, as a result, the technique can suppress, if applied systematically on an area-wide basis, populations of wild flies in an environmentally friendly way. The FAO/IAEA Agriculture and Biotechnology Laboratories have demonstrated that the four fruit flies freely interbreed, which means that instead of using males from the four supposedly different species, mass-produced sterile Oriental fruit fly males can now be used against all the different populations of this major pest.
“Globally, accepting these four pests as a single species will lead to reduced barriers to international trade, improved pest management, facilitated transboundary international cooperation, more effective quarantine measures, the wider application of established post-harvest treatments, improved fundamental research and, most importantly, enhanced food security for some of the world’s poorest nations,” Schutze said.
The findings of the FAO/IAEA coordinated study, published in the journal Systematic Entomology means that the four, previously considered distinct fruit-fly species, will now be combined under the single name: Bactrocera dorsalis, the Oriental fruit fly.
Troubling new developments unfold in war against invasive pest
Posted: Apr 30, 2014 2:06 AM CDT
Updated: Apr 30, 2014 4:05 AM CDT
By Chelsea Davis
HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) –
Coconut Rhinoceros Beetles (CRB) have been captured in new areas around O’ahu.
The latest detection was Tuesday afternoon at Ke’ehi Lagoon Park.
So are we losing the war against them?
The battle against the CRB began right before Christmas.
Now it has spread from Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam to other areas outside the base.
They’re a threat to an iconic image of Hawaii because the tiny pests have a voracious appetite for palm trees.
“The adult beetle will bore into the crowns of coconut trees and if enough damage is done to the coconut tree, it can actually kill the tree,” said Darcy Oishi, Hawaii State Plant Quarantine Manager.
Efforts to eradicate the pests are increasing.
In fact, traps have popped up all around the island.
Between April 12th and April 25th, surveyors found 26 adults beetles. All but two were at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam. One was found at Iroquois Point, the other at Ke’ehi Lagoon Park.
“That number of detections since we started the program is actually an indicator that we’re doing a pretty good job on containing the problem,” Oishi said.
The origin of the Rhino beetle still remains a mystery.
Oishi says trying to control population and eventually eradicate the pests is priority.
“This is gonna be a long project, it’s gonna be a three year project once we eliminate all the breeding sights that we know of to monitor and make sure there are no beetles,” he said.
State quarantine officials say it’s too early to say if the beetles are here to stay.
If you see the beetle or traps that have fallen, you are asked to call the pest hotline at (808) 643-PEST.
Policy paper
Plant biosecurity strategy for Great Britain
Organisations:
Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs and Forestry Commission
Page history:Published 30 April 2014 Policy:Sustaining and enhancing trees, forests and woodland
Overview of the activity that Defra and the devolved administrations are undertaking to improve plant biosecurity.
Document
Protecting Plant Health: A Plant Biosecurity Strategy for Great Britain
Ref: PB14168
PDF, 685KB, 34 pages
Global Plant Protection News 