Animals

Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is the careful consideration of all available pest control techniques and subsequent integration of appropriate measures that discourage the development of pest populations and keep pesticides and other interventions to levels that are economically justified and reduce or minimise risks to human health and the environment, focusing on all practical options for reducing or eliminating pesticides. The practice of IPM for crop protection is widely encouraged, as the practice can enhance crop production and reduce risks associated with use, storage and management of pesticides. The integrated nature of this approach ensures that it is climate smart, as it utilises the best possible options to ensure sustainable productivity, which will in turn allow adaptation to climate change. However, as it may require the use of pesticides as one strategy, the climate-smartness may be affected.

Flooding irrigation is a practice where water is pumped or allowed to flow into channels passing between crop rows in areas where farmers have level fields. This flooding system is an effective method of managing weeds and pests, preventing the completion of their lifecycles as they are either drowned or isolated from air and sunlight. This practice is applicable in areas where there are favourable climatic conditions with high rainfall amounts; and is not recommended in arid and semi-arid environments. Flooding is controlled using water pumps in order to reduce waterlogging problems, and fields should not be entirely flooded, with surges of periodic flooding used to distribute water and avoid wastage to run-off, evaporation and creation of anaerobic conditions in the soil. Flood waters can be filtered using a fine mesh to control pests and diseases from spreading to neighbouring fields. Sandy soil is not favourable for flood irrigation as it does not evenly distribute water across the field whereas loam and clay soils distribute water efficiently across the field.

It is considered a climate smart practice because it requires less energy, and can promote crop productivity, whilst controlling weeds and pests.

Locally/home-made organic pest control involves the use of home-made remedies to kill and control pests naturally without harming the crop or the environment. Some of the natural pesticides that farmers can use includes soap water, neem, chilli, vegetable oil spray and garlic. These natural remedies are cheaper than the use of chemicals but should be applied in specific amounts for them to be effective. The field must be kept clean to avoid weeds, which provide habitats for insects and weaker crops that are infected must be removed and disposed of away from the field area to avoid attracting further infestations. It is important to minimise disturbance of soil through digging or tilling if not necessary as this can introduce pests into the soil. Alternative approaches such as intercropping, crop rotation, and push/pull systems can also contribute to preventing the spread of pests. This is a climate smart option as it reduces the contribution of pesticides/insecticides to greenhouse gas emissions, and supports sustainable agricultural productivity. If organic insecticides are not effectively killing insects at the rate the farmer wants/needs, chemical controls can be used to halt pest infestation and avoid complete crop loss. However, chemical control of pests should always be the last resort, as chemical pesticides while often hugely effective, are expensive and must be applied precisely to be effective. Furthermore, if used inaccurately chemical pesticides can contaminate crops and the environment, and can impact the farmers’ health. The use of chemicals destroys natural pest enemies and can lead to pest invasion and resistance to pesticides in future, driving continued reliance on chemicals. For example, ants can be a very effective biological control agent against Fall Armyworm (FAW); however, ant populations will also be affected by pesticides.

The use of chemical insecticides and pesticides can be expensive and therefore not an economically viable option for small scale farmers, while also not being climate smart – widespread use of pesticides and herbicides contributes to greenhouse gas emissions. Encouraging natural predators can be an effective method for controlling and managing pests in some instances. With governments across the globe discouraging the use of chemical insecticides and pesticide products, biological control of pests is preferred and encouraged - using living organisms to control pests. Natural predators are insects that feed on pests without damaging the crop and can be found throughout the crops. Encouraging natural predators helps in supressing pests during their early and late lifecycles, improving crop production and reducing pollution caused by pesticides use. The introduction of water-fowl, such ducks in rice systems can be a highly effective form of biological control of pests. They enjoy aquatic habitats, consume insects and can even contribute to weeding as tear up weed plants as they look for food. Insect predators have different roles in controlling pests, there are predators that will control pests in the early pest lifecycle where they feed on their larvae and eggs while some are present at the late pest cycle where they feed on mature insects. Some species of ants are natural predators of stemborer pests, and wasp and some fly species larvae are parasitoids (larvae that feed on a host organism) prey on fall armyworm. One such wasp is the tiny (3 mm in length) Cotesia marginiventris which feeds on FAW caterpillars. The minute (0.5 mm in length) Trichogramma was species lays it’s eggs inside FAW eggs, killing the FAW larvae in the process. Earwigs (Dermaptera: Forficulidae, Carcinophoridae), ground beetles and ladybird beetles are also known to prey on FAW caterpillars. The issue with many of these solutions is volume of consumption, which may be too low to impact an infestation. Ants are the most important predators of FAW, as the communities consume larger quantities of FAW. However, pesticides drastically impact ant populations.

Bottle traps are an agricultural technology used to lure insects inside containers (bottles) containing bait of either food or chemical attractants. The objective is to lure pest insects to identify them for pest control, as part of overall pest monitoring, including field walks, observation and crop inspections. In larger fields they are used solely for pest identification. In smaller fields a number of traps can be used as a pest control method, trapping the insects, but this is not a common approach. Bottle traps must be installed in locations close to or amongst crops and across the farm in order to attract insects for identification and should be used throughout all cropping season to ensure that pests can be identified earlier. As a component of Integrated Pest Management, bottle traps with different lures or baits can be used to attract and identify most types of aphids and mites, fruit flies, stem borers, and fall army worm. While many of the lures and baits can be made at home or on the farm, pheromone-based baits need to be purchased from agricultural suppliers. While this introduces costs, bottle traps and lures can contribute significantly pest management, through early identification so appropriate action can be taken. This technology can contribute to climate smart agriculture objectives, as bottle traps and lures can reduce the amount of pesticides used, reducing greenhouse gas emissions; they can help with identifying new pests and insects as climates shift; and as pests are identified or reduced, productivity can increase. It is important for farmers and workers to keep records of pests identified to ensure that appropriate responses are enacted. There could be cases where infestation levels are low and the cost of taking action may be more that nominal crop losses. However, the opposite may be true, but decisions cannot be made without relevant information for extension workers to discuss with farmers.

A weed plant is an unwanted plant that grows among and competes with crops for water, air, sunlight, nutrients and space. The removal of such plants from fields – known as ‘weeding’ - is vital to enhancing crop growth. They can be removed by cutting their roots either by hand or using an implement such as a hoe. Some cereal crops like rice and maize attract weeds that are herbicide resistant; hence, the use of a hoe in removing the weeds is the most effective practice. However, as mechanic weeding can result in release of weed seeds into the soils as the hoe makes contact with the plant, weeding by-hand is the best way for weed removal to prevent weed seeds from falling onto the ground for further germination; this can increase the labour intensity of weeding considerably. This is a climate smart practice as it mitigates the emission of greenhouse gases from herbicides into the atmosphere, land and water systems. Furthermore, weeding helps maintain sustainable agricultural productivity, when considered an integral part of farm management and operations. However, weeding has been identified as one of the largest labour inputs for subsistence agriculture, accounting for between 30 and 50 % of on-farm labour requirements.

Short-term reactive practices are control options for pests and diseases once they have reached a level where the economic losses are likely to be greater than the cost of controlling the pest/disease outbreaks and can be used to maintain or increase production. Pests and diseases are better detected at an earlier stage to make it easier to act and prevent severe crop losses and prohibit the spread of pests and diseases throughout the whole field, achieved through regular and systematic field inspections. The practice is considered climate smart as it reduces losses, which in-balance lowers greenhouse gas emissions per tonne of crop produced, it retains agricultural productivity through management of pest infestation and/or disease outbreaks, and is applicable as it can assist farmers adjust to changing climate, and the threat of new and changing pest diseases.

A push pull system is a technique that repels parasitic plants and pests that attach themselves to the crop roots and feed on them.. In push-pull, a cereal crop is intercropped with a leguminous plant like desmodium or molasses grass, while a popular fodder crop, Napier grass, is planted as a border around the field. Desmodium produces volatile chemicals that attract predators of the cereal e.g of maize pests. More importantly, by giving a false distress signal to the moths that the area is already infested, these chemicals ‘push’ the egg laying moths away from the crop to seek out habitats where their larvae will face less competition for food. Napier grass also produces volatile chemicals that ‘pull’ the moths towards them, and then exudes a sticky substance that traps the stem borer larvae as they feed. Few larvae survive. Napier grass attracts stem borer predators.  The intercropping is a climate smart practice as it mitigates emission of Greenhouse gases through the reduced need for pesticides. The push-pull system improves food security and boosts farm income.

Resistant varieties are new crop varieties that improve yield production, are resistant to pests and diseases, more tolerant to drought, salinity or other changing or undesirable environmental conditions. Crop plants used within this practice are usually only resistant to a limited number of undesirable characteristics e.g. pests or drought – but usually not both, and some other desirable traits may be lost while others may be strengthened. Hence, careful selection of candidate species must be undertaken. Resistance varieties common in southern Africa include drought resistant maize, sorghum, rice and cowpea (beneficial legume for intercropping) strains, striga (witch weed) resistant sorghum and maize strains, and others all help farmers adapt to changing climate conditions, by being able to farm crops that survive the increasingly variable climate, which can result in less rainfall, or the presence of new pests. Striga results in crop losses totalling over USD 1 billion per year, whereas research has shown that planting climate resilient maize varieties can lead to up to a 25 % increase in crop yields.

Exploring new pest or drought resistant varieties in a regional will require demonstration and testing in ‘test plots’, so extension workers can ensure that the outcomes are aligned with farmers wants/needs/tastes, and so farmers are familiar with the new varieties before they are mainstreamed. Acceptance of new varieties, and any changes is traits will be critical, as resistant varieties is a key intervention for climate adaptation in southern Africa, as they will allow farmers to remain productive for longer under challenging conditions, and while different crops altogether are investigated.

Cultural pest control practices Are pest control management measures to control pests (insects, diseases, weeds) by manipulation of the environment or implementation of preventive practices including using plants that are resistant to pests, raising the mowing height of pastures to shade out weeds, aerating pastures to reduce compaction and plant stress. Several beneficial cultural practices can meet both demands, helping with pest and disease control and minimizing the use of toxic chemicals. In the insect pest management context, cultural practices may be considered as specific crop production practices that may be implemented either in the initial stages of the organic farm plan but also as a continuous plan to reduce the likelihood of insect pest infestation to a crop and damage. They form part of the Integrated Pest management (IPM) Practices and are based on tactics to disrupt pest infestation of crops by having the crop unavailable to pests in space and time, making the crop unacceptable to pests by interfering with host preference or location, reducing pest survival on the crop by enhancing natural enemies, altering the crop’s susceptibility to pests. The tactics or methods used in IPM include one or a combination of the following: Cultural control (crop rotation, use of locally adapted or pest resistant/tolerant varieties, sanitation, manipulating planting/harvest dates to avoid pests). Cultural pest control or IPM results in reduced pests/diseases and increased yields and is a climate-smart practice as its emphasis of prevention helps to control pests and diseases before they occur;  its continuous long-term practices without use of chemicals encourage healthier and more pest resilient crops and landscapes, encouraging the use of beneficial insects  making it an adaptation benefit. The possibility of prediction and recognition of pest outbreaks enables earlier management consultations and decisions. The reduction in losses results in lower GHG emissions per tonne produced.