Impacts on Insect and Mite Pests - Climate Resilient Agriculture for Ensuring Food Security - page 140

Spraying pesticides to control weeds and pests
usually kills natural enemies and/or destroys
their homes. As a consequence, an increase in the
pest population may occur (resurgence) and need
to spray more frequently, and resistant pests
might emerge.

7.20 Mitigation

Climate change mitigation encompasses the
actions being taken, and those that have been pro-
posed, to limit the magnitude and/or rate of long-
term global warming-induced climate change.

7.19.4 Avoidance of Depending
on One “High Input Variety” or
One Breed of Crop Variety

7.20.1 Breeding Climate-Resilient
Varieties

In order to minimize the impacts of climate and
other environmental changes, it will be crucial to
breed new varieties for improved resistance to
insect pests. Considering late onset and/or shorter
duration of winter, there is chance of delaying and
shortening the growing seasons for certain rabi/
cold season crops. Hence, there is a need to con-
centrate on breeding varieties suitable for late
planting and those that can sustain adverse climatic
conditions and pest and disease incidences.

Breeds should be mixed and changed. A broad
genetic variability serves as a foundation for
robust crops. In addition, it seems more recent
traditional breeding has not selected for CO 2
responsiveness, which simply means newer
breeds do not benefi t from elevated CO 2 as much
as older breeds (Ainsworth et al. 2008 ).

7.19.5 Following Crop Rotation
to Increase Biodiversity 7.20.2 Rescheduling of Crop

Calendars

A return to crop rotations would substantially
reduce soil erosion and water runoff and improve
the control of insects. They are sound agricultural
practices that should be widely used in agricul-
ture. Noxious pests establish slower because spe-
cifi c relationships between pests and host plants
are interrupted (Dhawan and Peshin 2009 ).

Global temperature increase and altered rainfall
patterns may result in shrinking of crop growing
seasons with intense problems of early insect
infestations. As such, certain effective cultural
practices like crop rotation and planting dates
will be less or not effective in controlling crop
pests with changed climate. Hence, there is a
need to change the crop calendars according to
the changing crop environment. The growers of
the crops have to change insect management
strategies in accordance with the projected
changes in pest incidence and extent of crop
losses in view of the changing climate.

7.19.6 Following Ecologically Based
Pest Management

Ecologically based pest management (EBPM)
considers belowground and aboveground habi-
tat management equally important. A “healthy”
soil, with optimal physical, chemical, biological
properties, increases plant resistance to insect
and diseases (Altieri et al. 2005 ). Excess of
nitrogen can increase the severity of certain dis-
eases and make a crop more susceptible to pests
(Altieri et al. 2005 ).

7.20.3 GIS-Based Risk Mapping
of Crop Pests

Geographic Information System (GIS) is an
enabling technology for entomologists, which help
in relating insect pest outbreaks to biographic and