1Prof. Jayashankar Telangana State Agricultural University, Hyderabad500030, India
2Agri Biotech Foundation, Hyderabad500030, India
3Division of Entomology, ICAR-Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi110012, India
4Biotechnology Consultant (Stewardship of GM Crops), Bangalore, 560017, India
5ICAR-Central Institute of Cotton Research, Regional Station, Sirsa124055, India
6Department of Entomology, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana, 141004, India
7International Crops Research Institute for Semi-Arid Tropics, Hyderabad502324, India
*Email: prof.tvksingh@yahoo.com (corresponding author)
Mega pests are those that have arisen in about past five decades, spread across a large part of the world and inflict prominent yield losses in the crops that these pests damage. Further, these have defied all the control tactics used against them with their innate genetic plasticity manifesting into insecticide resistant strains, host-plant resistance breaking biotypes and host-specific populations. These may be leaf or tissue eaters or sap suckers; may or may not be vectors of deadly viruses but, in common, remained a challenge to entomologists. Studying them together helps us to understand how their genetic and biological makeup with a repertoire of symbiotic microbes and how our mismanagement has turned them to be mega pests. This overview covers five such pests: Helicoverpa armigera, Nilaparvata lugens, Plutella xylostella, Pectinophora gossypiella and Bemisia tabaci and spans over their brief history, attempts and failure of their management in the past, recent developments in transgenic crops, insect and plant genomics and other molecular approaches to develop new tools to contain them.
Mega pests, History, Insecticidal resistance, Biotypes, Approaches to manage, Challenges
