Botanical pesticides, a potential ethnobotany Karo Regency to support food safety of the horticultural product

Abstract

The use of plants as materials to control pests was known by traditional communities before the introduction of synthetic pesticides. The use of botanical pesticides has received important attention along with the negative impacts of using synthetic pesticides on health and environment. In the world, Indonesia is the seventh-largest country with the number of species of plant. There are estimated more than 20,000 spesies and 25 percent of them are flowering plants. This study aims to determine the effectiveness of several native plants of Karo Regency, that have the potential as botanical pesticides to control pests in horticultural crops. Botanical pesticides are made by extraction methods, and indicator plants for observing pest attacks are potatoes. The results based on the inventory and exploration at Karo Regency, there are 12 species of plants that are most often used by farmers as botanical pesticides to control pests in horticultural crops from family Meliaceae, Solanaceae, Caricaceae, Asteraceae, Poaceae, Annonaceae, Rubiaceae, Euphorbiaceae and Amaryllidaceae. Botanical pesticide significantly reduced pest attack on plants, reduced population of Myzus pesicae and Phthorimaea operculella and increase potato yield. The most effective of botanical pesticides to control pests on potato plants were tobacco leaf extract, lemongrass extract, and soursop leaf extract, respectively.