AUTHOR(S)
N. Sakthivel*, P. Kumaresan1, S. M. H. Qadri 1, J. Ravikumar2 and R. Balakrishna2

ABSTRACT

Sericulture is an agro-based enterprise, highlysuited to small and marginal farm holdings with less capital investment. Cocoonproduction involves two distinct activities namely, mulberry leaf production,which is the sole feed for silkworm and silkworm rearing. Both mulberry andsilkworm are infested with a number of pests, which affect the cocoon qualityand productivity resulting in economic loss to the farmers. Chemical controlmeasure of pests is widely adopted by the farmers and its hazardous effects onhuman health and beneficial organisms are the least considered. Therefore,Integrated Pest Management (IPM) techniques mainly involving suitablebiological measures have been evolved and popularized for the control ofmulberry and silkworm pests. However, despite the favourable results, theadoption level has remained low. In this context, a study was conducted inThirunelveli and Virudunagar districts of Tamil Nadu with the informationcollected from 60 randomly selected farmers to understand the gap betweenavailable scientific knowledge in IPM practices and its adoption by sericulturefarmers. The results revealed that there was the highest technological gap(87.60 %) in the adoption of biological control measures against the mulberrypests whereas the gap with cultural/ mechanical practices was 33.30 % andminimum 9.80% in the adoption of chemical measures. In case of management ofuzifly menace on silkworms, there was no technological gap with respect tomechanical method of using nylon net to prevent the entry of uzifly inside the rearinghouse, whereas the technological gap of 77.00 % and 71.50% was observed forbiological and chemical control methods, respectively. Thus, the IPM practiceswith the special emphasis on biocontrol method needs to be popularized amongthe farmers by intensified extension efforts for wider adoption at the farmer’slevel.

DOI
https://doi.org/10.57182/jbiopestic.5.0.212-215

PAGES: 212-215 | 11 VIEWS | 5 DOWNLOADS

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