Abstract
In urban and peri-urban areas in West Africa, the cabbage Brassica oleracea L. (Brassicaceae) is protected using repeated high doses of synthetic insecticides. After a brief description of available IPM components, this paper presents a literature review focused on the botanical extracts that have been experimented with at the laboratory or in the field in West Africa against major cabbage pests. The literature reviewed mentions 19 plant species from 12 families used for cabbage protection in the subregion. The species most used are Azadirachta indica, Capsicum frutescens, Ocimum gratissimum and Ricinus communis. An overview of the world literature showed that a total of 13 plant species belonging to 8 families used to control cabbage pests are reported from the rest of Africa, and 140 plant species belonging to 43 families from the rest of the world. The most commonly used and tested plant species against insect pests in the three geographical areas considered is A. indica.
Highlights
In Africa, where vegetables are gaining ground in people’s diets, vegetable production is taking on more importance in the socioeconomic sector and sown areas are expanding.Nutritionally, vegetables improve the basic diet of populations [1], while economically and socially, their production significantly reduces unemployment [2] by giving job opportunities to a significant segment of urban dwellers [3].Urban demand for fresh vegetables is steadily increasing [4,5]
The main vegetable crops grown in the countries of the Economic Community of Western African States (ECOWAS) are lettuce (Lactuca sativa L.), tomato (Solanum lycospersicum L.), cabbages (Brassica oleracea L.), carrot (Daucus carota L.), African eggplant (Solanum macrocarpon L.), onion (Allium ascalonicum L., Allium cepa L.), bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.), cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.), eggplant (Solanum melongena L.), beetroot (Beta vulgaris L.), okra (Abelmoschus esculentus (L.) Moench), purple amaranth (Amaranthus blitum L.) and jute mallow or ‘crincrin’ (Corchorus olitorius L.) [6,7]
Since the WoS database does not include all the existing references, this first collection was completed with information found in papers, dissertations, technical information sheets and reports found via African references extracted from Google, Google Scholar, CIRAD’s Agritrop database and the Knowledge Base Knomana (KNOwledge MANAgement on pesticide plants in Africa) database currently being composed
Summary
In Africa, where vegetables are gaining ground in people’s diets, vegetable production is taking on more importance in the socioeconomic sector and sown areas are expanding.Nutritionally, vegetables improve the basic diet of populations [1], while economically and socially, their production significantly reduces unemployment [2] by giving job opportunities to a significant segment of urban dwellers [3].Urban demand for fresh vegetables is steadily increasing [4,5]. In Africa, where vegetables are gaining ground in people’s diets, vegetable production is taking on more importance in the socioeconomic sector and sown areas are expanding. Vegetables improve the basic diet of populations [1], while economically and socially, their production significantly reduces unemployment [2] by giving job opportunities to a significant segment of urban dwellers [3]. The development of vegetable growing in urban and peri-urban areas has the advantage of bringing farmers closer to consumers while making the most efficient use of agricultural water infrastructures. In urban and peri-urban areas of Africa, vegetables are often produced on small plots. In addition to the quantitative losses that could be assessed, there are qualitative ones related to market demand and customer perception. Farmers rely on cheap and effective pest control methods
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