Update: New Pest & Disease Records (05 February 2019)
We’ve selected a few of the latest new geographic, host and species records for plant pests and diseases from CAB Abstracts. Records this fortnight include the first report of grapevine yellow speckle viroid-2 infecting grapevines, the first report of hop stunt viroid infecting strawberries in China and the first report of bean yellow mosaic virus…
Using rice to filter pesticide runoff
Rice has been a staple food crop for millions of people for hundreds of years. This important crop is now a major part of 20% of the world’s population, with it being grown on every continent except Antarctica.Whilst rice is known to be an important part of our diet, recently published research has shown how…
Plant doctor advice increasing availability of clean banana suckers in Kitema, Uganda
In Uganda the majority of the young people are unemployed, and efforts to create employment opportunities within the agriculture sector are yielding little to no interest among them. Agriculture is not viewed as a viable employment sector, due to the perceptions that agriculture as a profession is labour intensive, results in high crop losses from…
Amid global soil crisis, governments struggle to reach farmers
By Fatima Arkin. Reblogged from devex. To help tackle nutrient deficiency and plastic pollution in India’s soils, the country has one of the best knowledge delivery systems and trained human resource power in agriculture research. And yet, over 59 percent of the farming households receive no assistance from either their government or the private sector,…
Update: New Pest & Disease Records (04 January 19)
We’ve selected a few of the latest new geographic, host and species records for plant pests and diseases from CAB Abstracts. Records this fortnight include the first report of Fusarium oxysporum as the causal agent of wild saffron corm rot disease in Iran, a report on two new hosts of Prillieuxina winteriana (Ascomycota) and the…
Agricultural pest control by bats in Madagascar
A new study has brought to light how native bat species in Madagascar are playing an important role in the control of agricultural crop pests. If more attention and information was brought to this, zoologists from the University of Cambridge believe that bats could reduce the financial strain on farmers for chemical pesticide use as…
Update: New Pest & Disease Records (20 December 18)
We’ve selected a few of the latest new geographic, host and species records for plant pests and diseases from CAB Abstracts. Records this fortnight include the first report of Polyphagotarsonemus latus in Saudi Arabia. The first report of Rhizoctonia solani from parthenium weed in Malaysia and a report on the Asian walnut moth in Turkey.
Plantwise Most Read 2018
With 2018 drawing to a close we take a look at the most popular articles on the Plantwise blog this year, along with some firm favourites.
El Puesto para Plantas de Achuapa, Nicaragua ayuda a mantener la producción de ajonjolí
Por Solveig Danielsen, Luis Medina, Patricia Castillo y Eduardo Hidalgo El ajonjolí es un cultivo de mucha importancia socioeconómica para los pequeños productores de la franja del pacífico de Nicaragua. Desde principio de los años 90, la Cooperativa Juan Francisco Paz Silva produce y procesa ajonjolí para la exportación de aceite a Estados Unidos, Inglaterra…
The Achuapa plant clinic helps to maintain sesame yields in Nicaragua
By Solveig Danielsen, Luis Medina, Patricia Castillo and Eduardo Hidalgo Sesame is a crop of great socioeconomic importance for smallholder farmers of the pacific region of Nicaragua. Since the early 90s, the Juan Francisco Paz Silva Cooperative has produced sesame oil, mainly for export to the United States, England and Japan.