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Tech, worked with colleagues to develop a protective lignin coating for the spores of a fungus that is a specific pathogen of locusts and grasshoppers. It targets those insects and does not affect non-target organisms.
“Occurrence of this fungus is low in the environment because of degradation from sunlight,” Agblevor says. “The lignin coating increases their resistance to ultraviolet radiation 15 times as compared to non-coated spores. This technology is applicable to many other biopesticides and should make them more effective as well.”
The coated spores are now being commercially produced in Senegal and South Africa under the label “Green Muscle” and have already been used effectively to halt the advance of locust swarms. (See a video about Green Muscle in French.)
Pesticide Education in Mali
As part of a concerted pesticide education program in Mali, in late May and early June of 2007, the IPM CRSP sponsored a first-of-its-kind professional development workshop in Bamako, Mali for pesticide safety educators in West Africa.
“The workshop was a great chance to let others see what we have been doing and why,” explains
Pat Hipkins, assistant coordinator of
Virginia Tech Pesticide Programs. “To a person, everyone was glad to get the materials and put them to use.”
Hipkins, along with Tech researchers
Don Mullins and
Jean Cobb, has been working in Mali for nine years
developing pesticide safety programs. “Farmers told us they didn’t realize that one pesticide is more toxic than another, or that some pesticides kill some insects and not others.”
At the workshop, attended by over 60 people representing 20 agencies from five West African countries (Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad, Senegal and Mali), pesticide safety trainers met to exchange information, identify pesticide safety program needs, discuss collaborative efforts, and share techniques for measuring impacts.
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