Pest Management Knowledge and Practices of Mango Farmers in Southeastern Ghana

Journal of Integrated Pest Management (2017) 8 (1): 13; 1–7 doi: 10.1093/jipm/pmx008 Surveys and Needs Assessments Pest Management Knowledge and Practices of Mango Farmers in Southeastern Ghana Clement Akotsen-Mensah,1,2 Isaac N. Ativor,3,4 Roger S. Anderson,1 Kwame Afreh-Nuamah,1,2 Collison F. Brentu,2 Dorcas Osei-Safo,5 Alfred Asuming Boakye,2 and Victor Avah6 1 African Regional Postgraduate Program in Insect Science, P.M.B L59, University of Ghana, Legon (; ; ), 2Forest and Horticultural Crops Research Center, School of Agriculture, College of Basic and Applied Sciences, University of Ghana, Kade, Ghana (; ), 3Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR)-Oil Palm Research Institute, Coconut Research Program, P. O. Box 245, Sekondi, Ghana (), 4Corresponding author, e-mail: , 5Department of Chemistry, College of Basic and Applied Sciences, University of Ghana, Legon, Ghana (), and 6Department of Agriculture, Shai Osudoku District Assembly, Dodowa, Ghana () The authors do not have any potential conflict of interest in this work. Mentioning of a product in this article does not mean an endorsement by the authors. This is purely an information for the reader and that anyone who intends to use any product mentioned in this article should seek further information. Subject Editor: Erin Hodgson Received 24 January 2017; Editorial decision 11 April 2017 Abstract Mango farmers in Ghana are confronted with many pest problems like fruit flies, Sternochetus mangiferae (F.), and mealy bugs. Different pest management options are available to mango farmers; however, the extent to which they apply the available pest management options is not well known. A survey was conducted among 60 farmers in southeastern Ghana, from October–December 2015 mango season, to find out the level of knowledge and practice of insect pest management used by mango farmers. The results showed that most farmers use conventional insecticides to control insect pests in mango. Majority of the farmers (30%) use a composite insecticide (Cydim super; 36 g cypermethrin þ 400 g dimethoate per liter), whereas 3.3% use Pyrinex (chlorpyrifos 480 g/liter). Majority of insecticides used belong to WHO category II. Ninety percent (90%) of the farmers use cultural practices and pheromone traps. Pheromone traps are, however, used for fruit flies but not for S. mangiferae. Over 80% of the respondents who used pesticides to control pests have also adopted GLOBALGAP standards for certification. The results are discussed based on the importance of adoption of IPM strategies in mango production and the possible reduction of fruit rejection during mango export in Ghana. Key words: Sternochetus mangiferae, integrated pest management (IPM), organophosphate Mango, Mangifera indica L., is one of the important commercial fruit tree crops in the world. It is grown in the tropical and subtropical climates, making it second to citrus in terms of production. India is the world’s leading producer of mango with estimated production of 15 million metric tons followed by China with 4.3 million metric tons (Food and Agricultural Organization of United Nations [FAO] 2010). In the West Africa subregion, mango production and export to the European market was estimated to have increased from 15,000 to over 22,000 tons, indicating a rise of 45% in 2012 (ECOWAS-TEN Newsletter 2012). However, mangoes exported to some European countries were intercepted, confiscated, and destroyed because of the presence of insects considered as quarantine pests, thus leading to huge economic losses to the exporters and the whole horticultural sector of most of the exporting countries including Ghana (ACP-EU, Newsletter 2013). For instance, there were over 90 interceptions of mango from the subregion, the highest was from Cote d’lvoire, which led with 34 interceptions followed by 28 interceptions from Ghana. The cost of this was valued at US$3.67 million at a rate of US$39,348 per interception in 2012 (ECOWASTEN Newsletter 2012). In light of the numerous fruit interceptions to the major markets, especially the European Union, there have been several attempts to understand whether the levels of interception are due to the presence of insect pests or their damage. Like most perennial fruit crops, mango production in Ghana and other countries is plagued with many insect pests. The most common ones are fruit flies (Ceratitis spp., Bactrocera spp., C The Author 2017. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Entomological Society of America. V 1 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. For commercial re-use, please contact Downloaded https://academic.oup.com/jipm/article-abstract/8/1/13/3827858 by guest on 13 May 2018 2 Dacus spp. etc.) and Sternochetus mangiferae (F.). In many situations, efforts of pest management are concentrated on these two insects in Ghana. The S. mangiferae, for instance, is recognized as one of the key international quarantine pest, and their presence in the mango production system provides enough justification for rejection of fruits in the export market (Arthur et al. 2009, Braimah and Van Emden 2010). Their presence in mango fruit also requires that stringent management practices be applied, which eventually increases cost of production. The success of fruit flies and S. mangiferae as pests of mango has been attributed to the fact that although they have natural enemies, they are not capable of providing sufficient controls in both treated and untreated orchard, and no effective natural enemy has been recorded particularly, for the S. mangiferae (Pena et al. 1998, Peng and Christian 2007) in Ghana. Several insect pest control options are available to mango farmers in Ghana. Currently, methyl eugenol, a parapheromone mixed with recommended insecticides, is recommended for mango farmers to use for the control of fruit flies (Abdulahi et al. 2011). However, there are no such pheromones and attractants available for other equally important pests of mango and thus farmers resort to the use of conventional insecticides to control these insects. In most cases, the use of insecticides such as pyrethroids and organophosphates are for the control of fruit flies (Abdulahi et al. 2011) but also provide some protection against S. mangiferae and other insect pests. Although farmers use insecticides as major control option, the problem of pest interception is still relatively high in mangoes meant especially for European markets. The objective of this study was to investigate the level of pest management practices of mango farmer in Ghana and also assess farmers’ knowledge in the practice of pest management. The ultimate goal of the work is to identify the weak links in the fa (...truncated)