Insect Pests of Fruits, Plantation, Medicinal & Aromatic Crops

Definitions

Decision making

• Decision making is the key stone in insect pest management programmes; it indicates the course of action to be taken in any pest situation.
Economic Damage: is the amount of injury, which justifies the cost of artificial control measures.
Gain Threshold: is the tem used to express the beginning point of economic damage.

Management cost (Rs. /acre)

Gain Threshold = ——————————————————= kg/acre

Market value of the product (Rs. /kg)

Economic Injury Level (EIL): is defined as the lowest number of insects that will cause economic damage or the minimum number of insect that would reduce yield equal to gain threshold.
Economic Threshold (ET):

• Indicate the number of insects (density or intensity) / damage when management action should be taken to prevent population/ damage reaching EIL.
Market value/crop value: is one of the most variable factors and accounts for much of the change in EILs. The relationship between EIL and market value is inverse.
Management Costs: The cost of managing a pest population must be estimated before profitability of an action can be assessed.