Q.What is pest management? What do you understand by integrated pest management?

Pest management keeps pest damage below a harmful level; IPM combines biological, cultural, mechanical and (minimal) chemical methods for eco-friendly control.

Pest management:

Pests are organisms — insects, weeds, mites, rodents, fungi and other pathogens — that damage crops and reduce yield. Pest management (pest control) refers to the methods used to keep pest populations low enough that they do not cause economic loss (i.e. below the economic threshold), rather than trying to wipe them out completely. Sole reliance on chemical pesticides is discouraged because pesticides pollute the environment, kill beneficial organisms, cause biomagnification and lead to pesticide resistance in pests.

Integrated Pest Management (IPM):

IPM is a broad, ecological and eco-friendly approach that combines several complementary control methods in a planned way, so that chemical pesticides are used only when absolutely necessary. Its methods include:

1. Biological control: using natural enemies of pests — predators, parasites and pathogens (e.g. ladybird beetles against aphids, Trichogramma wasps, Bacillus thuringiensis against caterpillars).
2. Cultural control: farming practices such as crop rotation, proper tillage, timely sowing, intercropping, and destroying crop residues to break the pest life cycle. …