Fruit Pest Management in Pakistan

A Review

Abstract

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The purpose of this article is to review several techniques being employed to control various pest species of fruit crops in Pakistan. Fruit pests cause considerable damage to Pakistan’s economy as fruit crops contribute approximately 13% in the GDP of Pakistan. Fruit exports of Pakistan reach up to 2366.5 billion rupees. Unfortunately, major portion of these crops is lost annually because of pre-harvest or post-harvest pest infestations. Fruit flies, citrus whiteflies, cloudywinged whitefly, citrus blackfly, citrus leafminer, Nile whitefly, Pepper whitefly, common walkingsticks, gall midge, mealy bugs, moths and aphids are most important pest species that infest various fruit crops e.g. mangoes, citrus, grapes, guava, peach, apple, date palm, banana, etc. in Pakistan. Fruit flies pose biggest threat as they infest more than 50 fruit crops. Pest control strategies practiced in the country include physical methods e.g. traps, baits, bands, etc.; botanical control, i.e. using plant extracts to which pests are attracted and then killed or plant-based pest repellents; chemical control involving several types of insecticides, pesticides etc. Recently integrated pest management techniques are emerging as successful and eco-friendly method involving all the available measures to cope with a wide range of pest species e.g. plant-based insecticides, traps and baits, mechanical and cultural methods, male annihilation technique (MAT), sterile insect techniques (SIT) etc.; but these techniques have certain limitations too. Therefore, the need arises to continuously work for the betterment of existing pest management techniques and proposing new innovative methods to minimize pest infestations and yield losses in fruit crops.