Projects
Photo source

Parasitoids Production

The problem of wide-spectrum toxins

Fall army worm (FAW) scientifically known as Spodoptera frugiperda is a destructive pest affecting maize and capable of causing significant yield loss to farmers. The FAW larvae attacks maize plant at all development stages. Since 2016 when it first reached Africa, the pest has rapidly spread to nearly every country in Sub-Saharan Africa.
‍
We have established a Fall Armyworm (FAW) parasitoid rearing facility at Moi University-Alupe, where mass production of FAW Bioagents is carried out. Often farmers fight FAW using wide-spectrum pesticides. Such pesticides are cheap but have adverse effects on farms, people, and nature:

  1. Wide-spectrum pesticides kill FAW and non-pests like bees, stink bugs, ants, earwigs, and many others. These non-pests are natural enemies of FAW. Killing them means that FAW reproduction gets out of natural control. Moreover, pesticides destroy these beneficial non-pests more rather than the FAW.
  2. When a pesticide is first used, a small proportion of the pest population may survive exposure to the material due to their distinct genetic makeup. These individuals pass along the genes for resistance to the next generation and thus develop resistance to the pesticide. This makes the control of FAW using synthetic pesticides difficult.
  3. Pesticides contain toxins that stay on the plants and, as a result, are consumed by humans. It harms human health and life length.

Fight Fall Armyworm and other pests using the power of nature

Dream Team Agro Consultancy Limited was funded by Feed The Future Innovation Lab for Current and Emerging Threats to crops (CETC IL) to scale integrated pest management packages in maize production. In our Alupe lab, we mass rear and release egg parasitoids like Telenomus remus & Trichogramma chilonis to control FAW. Egg Parasitoids usage is effective, selective, non-polluting, non-resistance inducing, and affordable to resource-limited rural and urban communities.

Then we deliver parasitoids to farmers who request them and educate them on release protocols and their conservation.

How the pest control over parasitoids works

Parasitoids are species whose immature stage develops on or within a single insect host, ultimately killing the host.

Parasitoids locate the pest eggs in the crop and parasitize them by inserting their eggs in pest eggs. FAW larvae will not emerge from egg. Instead, more Telenomus and Trichogramma emerge out of affeted pest eggs. Then the adult parasitoids search and parasitize new FAW eggs in crops, thus suppressing pest population.

Join the project!

Anyone can join the project. Just call or message us and schedule parasitoids delivery. As well you can have just a consultancy.

Keep updated

YouTube