Biologically based methods of pest control: Contributions to a sustainable agriculture

Extract

Concern continues to rise over the adverse effects of the excessive use of chemically based agricultural pesticides, including herbicides, insecticides, nematicides, and fungicides. Important members of the U.S. agricultural scientific, producer, and policy communities have added their voices to those in the environmental, consumer, and public health arenas in pointing to the need for more benign and cost effective methods and systems of pest management and control. Indeed, the urgent need to further enhance the efficacy and use of such varied, yet interrelated, approaches to pest control as pathogens, predators, and parasites (traditional biological control), and such biologically based techniques as host plant resistance, natural plant products, semiochemicals, and autocidal methods, is now widely recognized in most agricultural circles.