26 April 2023, Madakkathara, Thrissur, Kerala
Cassava (Tapioca) is an important root crop and a major food source for over 300 million people in tropical regions of the world.
Tapioca is used in the preparation of various food delicacies in Kerala. Invasion of invasive cassava mealybug (CMB), Phenacoccus manihoti resulted in huge crop damage and losses to the farmers of Tamil Nadu and Kerala.
The occurrence of cassava mealybug in the country was first detected at Thrissur in 2020 by the ICAR-National Bureau of Agricultural Insect Resources, Bengaluru. Consequently, in order to keep the cassava production by saving the crop from mealybug infestation, ICAR-NBAIR has imported a highly host-specific parasitoid wasp, Anagyrus lopezi from IITA, Republic of Benin, West Africa as per the Government of India guidelines during August 2021.
Several field release programmes were organized by this Bureau during the past year across all districts of Tamil Nadu where cassava is being grown as the predominant crop. The classical biological control agent has been performing extremely well in all the released sites of Tamil Nadu and could bring down the cassava mealybug population drastically in a short span of time.
Looking at the impact of the parasitoid in cassava mealybug management in Tamil Nadu and considering, the current level of cassava mealybug problem in Kerala.ICAR-NBAIR in collaboration with ICAR-CTCRI, Thiruvananthapuram, AICRP-BC, KAU, Thrissur centre has jointly organized the field release programme of the parasitoid, Anagyrus lopezi in Madakkathara panchayat, Thrissur today.
Dr. S.N. Sushil, Director, ICAR- NBAIR, Bengaluru and Dr. G.Byju, Director, ICAR-CTRCRI, Thiruvananthapuram presided over the meeting and distributed the parasitoids to the farmers.
More than 100 tapioca-growing farmers in the region participated in this programme.
Madakkatharagram Panchayat President, Kerala Agricultural University officers, State Agricultural Department officials of Kerala, CIPMC and PQS officials of Kochi participated in the event.
(Source: ICAR-National Bureau of Agricultural InsectResources, Bengaluru.)
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