Defining biotechnological solutions for insect control in sub‐Saharan Africa

• Published in: Food and energy security Vol. 9; no. 1
• Main Authors: Botha, Anna‐Maria, Kunert, Karl J., Maling’a, Joyce, Foyer, Christine H.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Bognor Regis John Wiley & Sons, Inc 01.02.2020; Wiley
• Subjects: Agricultural management; Agricultural production; Agriculture; biotechnology; Carbon dioxide; Climate change; Climate models; Control; Corn; CRISPR/Cas; Crop diseases; Crops; Diuraphis noxia; Economic impact; Economics; fall armyworm; Food; Food insecurity; Food production; Food security; GDP; Genetically modified crops; Genetically modified organisms; Global temperature changes; Gross Domestic Product; Groundnuts; Impact analysis; Insect control; Insects; integrated pest management; invasive pests; iRNA; Malnutrition; Metabolism; Nitrogen; Nonnative species; Pest control; Pests; Prediction models; Rain; Rain and rainfall; Rainfall; resistance breeding; Russian wheat aphid; Sorghum; Spodoptera frugiperda; Starvation; Temperature; Undernutrition; Weather forecasting; Wheat; Sub-Saharan Africa; Africa
• ISSN: 2048-3694; 2048-3694
• DOI: 10.1002/fes3.191

Africa is burdened by food insecurity with nearly a billion people suffering from starvation, undernutrition, and malnutrition. Climate change prediction models forecast changes in rainfall patterns and rising temperature regimes, with impacts particularly on Southern and East Africa. These predictions are especially concerning for the production of major food crops, such as maize, sorghum, millet, and groundnut, because median temperature increases are associated with increased pest pressure and changes in migratory patterns. These factors will result in significantly more pest invasions and an increased need for innovative insect management practices. This review focuses on pest control strategies, highlighting important examples, their economic impact, and new alternative pest control strategies. African policymakers remain hesitant to move forward with establishing biosafety laws and commercializing GM crops, and it is often difficult to implement regulatory measures in smallholder agriculture to increase efficacy. This review summarizes current knowledge on insect pests based largely on the historical record of insect species that are already invasive, and that already greatly affect crop production in Africa, and unfortunately entering Europe and Asia in the future. The invasiveness of existing insect pests might increase further due to climatic changes that provide a better habitat and environmental conditions for growth and reproduction. In addition to classical insect control strategies, we discuss possible new strategies of insect control, highlighting biotechnological approaches that might limit or prevent climate change‐induced insect invasions.