It is a relatively generalized concept among agronomists and other Western investigators, that in the People’s Republic of China biological control is used as the principal control measure for crop protection. The classic story of the first known usage of biological control with human intervention in the world having been in China, through the usage of predatory ants, of the species Oecophylla smaragdina, in citrine orchards, of which the first record remounts to 324 BC, contributes to establishing that image.
While emphasising an interest in developing pilot projects in eco-agriculture, no reference is made to biological control or integrated pest management in the official agricultural yearbooks, which in addition associate a growth of chemical control to an increase in productivity. However, despite the evident predominance of chemical control, there is in China a vast group of researchers and institutions which embrace, in an almost complete way, the diverse themes of biological control.
These actions for the development of biological control will have to adapt themselves to the new Chinese reality, where decision making is no longer circumscribed to the communes’ direction as before, in strict collaboration with state-run programmes, but open to a vast number of family-run explorations, motivated to rapidly increase their profit. One arrives, therefore, at a situation in which a monoculture system gave way to the polyculture of small landed estates.
In China, investigation on insect sexual pheromones started in the beginning of the 1970’s, having been produced in 1997 pheromones of at least the following 23 species: Adoxophes orana, Agrotis ipsilon, Ancylis saliva, Carposina nipponensis, Chilo infuscatellus, Chilo suppressalis, Cydia pomonella, Dacus cucurbitae, Dacus dorsalis, Dendrolimus punctatus, Dichocrocis punctiferalis, Grapholitha molesta, Helicoverpa armigera, Homona magnanima, Mythimna separata, Naranga aenescens, Ostrinia furnacalis, Ostrinia nubilalis, Paranthrene tabaniformes, Pectinophora gossypiela, Plutella xylostella, Proceras venosatus and Sesamia inferens.
Pesticide Eco-Alternatives Center Yunnan Thoughtful Action (PEAC) was created in February 2002. The mission of PEAC is to reduce the use of harmful pesticides in China and to promote alternative ecological forms of pest control, and eventually protect the human health and ecological health for sustainable development http://panchina.org/english/
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