For farmers in Vietnam, the agricultural environment is very dynamic. Changes in weather patterns, consumer behavior, the availability of labor, the availability of crop protection products, and the crop pest patterns, require farmers to adjust their agricultural practices to sustain and improve both crop quantity and quality. Badly adopted cultivation practices can lead to increasing problems with insecticide resistance.
Farmers in Vietnam (VN) are experiencing increasing insecticide resistance, rendering their efforts in crop protection inefficient even though they can choose between more than 1500 different insecticide brands, which represent over 600 different active ingredients. If the offer is so diversified, why are farmers running into trouble? The key question is, how to decide which product to use? Interviews with farmers reveal that most believe that they should rotate different products, for insecticide resistance management (IRM).
This shows that farmers are clearly lacking available, essential IRM guidance.
- For rotation, farmers need to know how to select best-fit products, among dozens of hundreds of available insecticides brands, to use.
- Product rotation should be associated with insect generations and the product’s mode of action (MoA) which is indicated by IRAC group numbers.
- The product MoA should be printed on product labels in a standardized manner, including essential information on IRM, as proposed by IRAC and CropLife International. So far, MoA labelling is still only optional for VN manufacturers.
IRAC VN, in association with CropLife VN, are engaging to help farmers to better manage insecticide resistance in the future and planning to:
- be fully committed to comply with IRAC guidance (MoA icon, IRM statement)
- encourage all VN pesticide manufacturers to implement MoA labelling practice
- engage the VN Government agency to make MoA labelling mandatory
- create online IPM, RM, RAC guidance resources in Vietnamese
- establish train-the-trainer programs together with CropLife VN, government agencies, and other stake holders to increase IRM awareness and practice