Background:
The beneficial insects are required to suppress the population of harmful insect pests which are damaging the crops and its products. The productivity of the crops is affected by biotic stresses of insect pests, diseases and nematodes, which cause losses to the tune of 25-30%. Reducing these losses would contribute towards achieving food security. Biological alternatives to chemical pesticides provide effective solutions to the pest problem and are effective to the tune of 50-60%. Their use, however, has remained extremely low due to a number of technological, socio-economic and institutional constraints.:
Technology details:
Implementation of eco-friendly integrated pest management technology requires the supply of beneficial insects. These insects are mass multiplied in laboratory which is labour intensive and health hazardous process. The present invention is for the conservation, multiplication and to enhance the population of beneficial insects (parasitoids) directly at the targeted sites. It consists of an insect rearing unit having insect multiplication media in it. The unit is provided with a roof to safeguard it from rains and sunlight in the fields. The unit is connected with an arrangement for adjusting the height of the unit in the fields. This arrangement facilitates readily available food source and an alternative oviposition site to the parasitoids allowing them to multiply in abundance in crop fields. These parasitoids may control the insect pest population present on the crops and may thus get further multiplied. The insect rearing unit can be charged time to time with the multiplication media to further enhance the parasitoid wasps’ population during different crop growth periods, however, proper, safe discard, disposal off and destroy of the residual population is mandatory.