UNE > News and Events > Browse by article > Award for new approach to cotton pest control

Next Big crowd celebrates young artists’ work May 25, 2005  

Previous Celebrities talk at youth forum May 23, 2005 

Award for new approach to cotton pest control

May 24, 2005

Gregg Peter.jpgA research team led by a scientist from The University of New England has won a national award for developing a new approach to the selective poisoning of destructive moths on cotton farms.

Their research, based on a thorough knowledge of the moth’s behaviour, has resulted in a method of using only small amounts of insecticide for effective control of the pest.

Associate Professor Peter Gregg from UNE’s School of Rural Science and Agriculture led the team at the Australian Cotton Cooperative Research Centre (Cotton CRC) that won an Award for Excellence in Innovation from the Cooperative Research Centres Association. It was one of several similar awards presented at the Association’s annual conference in Melbourne last week. They recognise the best research from about 70 CRCs across Australia for application to industry, medicine, the environment and agriculture.

Dr Gregg (pictured here) accepted the award together with Mr Guy Roth, Chief Executive Officer of the Cotton CRC, and Mr Patrick Buerger, Managing Director of Ag Biotech Australia Pty Ltd. (Ag Biotech is the company that is commercialising the new pest management tool, named Magnet®.) Dr Gregg’s UNE colleague Dr Alice Del Socorro, who carried out much of the laboratory and field work for the project, also attended the ceremony.

The Vice-Chancellor of UNE, Professor Ingrid Moses, and the Dean of UNE’s Faculty of The Sciences, Professor Margaret Sedgley, who both attended the presentation ceremony, congratulated Dr Gregg and his team. “UNE has a long history of research with the cotton industry and is a major provider of graduates who work in cotton communities,” Professor Moses said. “We are delighted to receive this award with the Cotton CRC and Ag Biotech.”

Dr Gregg said that for the cotton industry, and the communities in which the industry operates, the benefits of Magnet® would be substantial. “Worldwide, major losses are caused by larvae of Helicoverpa moths in cotton crops,” he said. “The pest also affects other crops, causing losses through reduced yields and costs of control in excess of $US2 billion annually. Australian losses are estimated at over $A300 million annually.”

Magnet® is a blend of five plant volatiles (naturally occurring chemicals that give plants their characteristic smells, to insects as well as to humans). The blend is combined with very small amounts of insecticides already used in cotton, along with a feeding stimulant and various substances used to stabilise the formulation. It is applied with equipment similar to that already in use by farmers.

“Insects are lured to a deposit of insecticide and killed,” Dr Gregg said. “This can give selective control using tiny amounts of cheap broad-spectrum insecticides, without the destruction of beneficial insects which normally accompanies use of these chemicals. An application of Magnet® is currently priced at about $15 per hectare; other new selective insecticides generally cost more than $50 per hectare.

“Plant volatiles offer the possibility of attacking the adult stage (moths) rather than the larval stage (caterpillars), as conventional insecticides do. Since each female Helicoverpa moth can produce 1,000-2,000 eggs, and the moths are very mobile, killing a relatively small number of moths might effectively reduce pest populations over a wide area.”


Media contact: Associate Professor Peter Gregg, School of Rural Science and Agriculture, UNE (02) 6773 2665 or 0427 727 931, or Jim Scanlan, Public Relations, UNE (02) 6773 3049.

For a PHOTOGRAPH taken at the presentation ceremony, please contact Jim Scanlan on (02) 6773 3049.

Posted by Jim Scanlan at May 24, 2005 11:39 AM