TECHNICAL STAFF'S KNOWLEDGE LEVEL ABOUT INTEGRATED PEST MANAGEMENT AND THEIR FEATURES

Gul M., AKPINAR M. G., Demircan V., Yilmaz H., Bal T., Arici S. E., ...Daha Fazla

SCIENTIFIC PAPERS-SERIES MANAGEMENT ECONOMIC ENGINEERING IN AGRICULTURE AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT, cilt.17, sa.2, ss.157-163, 2017 (ESCI) identifier

Özet

Integrated fight is briefly described as the administration and management system of pests and expressed as integrated pest control or integrated pest management. Within this definition it is defined as all of the efforts undertaken in order to keep the pest populations below economically damaging levels in harmony with each other on the use of all the techniques and methods and all factors that play a role in the exchange of populations of pest species with their environment in mind. This study was aimed to determine Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Animal Husbandry technical staff's knowledge level about integrated pest management and their features. Study is contributed by evaluating technical staff general features, ideas on integrated pest management and their observations on farmers to development of program. Main material of the study was gathered from face to face interview of 134 technical staff which work on Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Animal Husbandry Department on Antalya, Denizli, Konya, Karaman, Nigde and Isparta cities which are dominant for apple production. Serving as consultants or pest management department employees were included in the study. Technical staff members have important position by raising awareness of producers' agricultural management. It was determined that the technical staff is aware of the use of pesticides, but their level of knowledge in the pest management approaches such as integrated pest management is not at the desired level. Integrated pest management should be improved, especially in terms of monitoring the new developments taking place in the EU. According to technical staff observations farmers' awareness about the disease and pest management has not at the desired level yet. It is inevitable the necessity of extension to increase producers' knowledge and awareness and implementation more of integrated pest management.