Trichoderma helps prevent pests, diseases
In an effort to mitigate the hazardous effects of using chemical pesticides in agriculture, the government institutionalized the practice of organic farming through Republic Act 10068 otherwise known as the Organic Agriculture Act of 2010.
Organic agriculture is a “holistic production management system which promotes and enhances agro-ecosystem health, including biodiversity, biological cycles, and soil biological activity,” according to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization.
Thus, biological control agents (BCA) are used in place of chemical pesticides in managing pests and diseases in organic crops.
BCA are insects or organisms that suppress pest or pathogen. An example of these are microbials which are composed of microorgarnisms such as fungi, bacteria and viruses that suppress the effects of pests and diseases.
In Cordillera, the Bureau of Plant IndustryBaguio National Crop Research, Development and Production Support Center conducted a study “Enhancing the Utilization of Microbials and Botanicals for Organic Agriculture in support to Organic Stakeholders in the Cordillera Administrative Region.”
Funded by the Bureau of Agricultural Research, the project was aimed at identifying the most suitable BCA and botanicals in the region that would increase the income of their farmers.
One of the biocontrol agents that they studied is the trichoderma. These are “free-living fungi that are common in soil and root ecosystems,” according to experts.
Trichoderma strains exert biocontrol against fungal phytopathogens either indirectly, by competing for nutrients and space, modifying the environmental conditions, or promoting plant growth and plant defensive mechanisms and antibiosis, or directly, by mechanisms such as mycoparasitism,” as explained by experts.
It can be used for different vegetables such as potato, cabbage, garden peas, bush beans, etc., said Rhonda Oloan, a member of the research team.
Trichoderma clarified it can be used to suppress or manage most of the soil borne diseases of highland vegetables.
After the evaluation trials on-station and on-farm, the research team started to mass produce the microbials for distribution to farmers whose land were infected with soil borne diseases and infested with potato cyst nematode.
The technologies generated through their research were disseminated to the farmers through conduct of trainings and field days and distribution of information, education and communication materials.
After a year of using trichoderma on her farm, Geraldine Bascos, a farmer from Bauko, Mt. Province, started to notice the improvement on her crops.
Last year, she already started producing her own trichoderma using the pure culture she outsourced from BPI-BNCRDC.
The research team was able to notice that more farmers are now aware on how to use these BCAs on their farms.