Biocontrols Conference Features Top Experts
February 1, 2022 Biocontrols USA Conference and Expo, the country’s only national conference devoted to agricultural biocontrols and biostimulants, will be held in Monterey, CA, March 1-2, with a tour of area farms preceding the conference on Feb. 28.
Pam Marrone, Founder/Director of Marrone Bio Innovations and Chestnut Bio Advisors, will deliver the keynote speech. Her opening talk is titled “Biologicals Primed for Explosive Growth.” She will cover the latest trends in biologicals, including the convergence of tech and biology, the increasing number of startups, and the benefits of biologicals to reduce carbon footprint. This session will drill down on the remaining barriers for their use and how to overcome them.
Marrone, whose knowledge of the industry is virtually unparalleled, says there are three main reasons why biological products are taking off.
- Biologicals are getting better and better as new scientific tools are being applied to discovery and development.
- Genomics is helping us unravel what is happening with microorganisms in the soil and the effect of biological inputs, including the reduction of the carbon footprint.
- There is a convergence of precision tools and IPM allowing better targeting of biologicals.
The conference also features a breakout session devoted to fruit growing. One of the most devastating pests of small fruits such as berries, spotted wing drosophila (SWD), will be addressed by perhaps one of the foremost experts on biocontrols in the country, Kent Daane, Professor of Cooperative Extension, University of California, Berkeley.
Daane’s talk is titled “New Weapon in the War on Spotted Wing Drosophila,” which is encouraging for the many growers dismayed by the pest who have to use multiple insecticide applications to keep it in check. Daane says that approach may be changing with a new sustainable control measure: the parasitoid Ganaspis brasiliensis. After seven years of foreign exploration in Asia and quarantine studies in the U.S. and Switzerland, this parasitoid is ready for release this year. Daane will explain how this biological control can reduce SWD populations and damage to your fruit crops.
In addition, Daane will give a brief talk on a pest on which he has been an authority for many years, vine mealybug. He will provide grape growers with biological solutions to the pest, including learning why it’s such a problem, how to identify it, and how to control it in this short and sweet presentation.
The registration fee for growers – who pay a much lesser fee than others who attend – is just $345 until Feb. 25, when the rate goes up. Click here for details.
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