The Potential Use of Natural Essential Oils in the Fumigation of Stored Agricultural Products

摘要

The authors give an overview of the concentrations of essential oils to control insect pests of stored grain, analyze the current prices of essential oils on the market and the cost of the fumigation, and discuss the potential of the introduction and the use of essential oil to fumigate stored grain.As with other groups of insecticides, the potential use of the natural essential oils (EO) in stored grain insect pest management depends on many barriers. Some of the barriers that may greatly prevent the adoption and use of the natural EO in stored grain fumigation are their relatively high concentrations needed for the effective protection of stored grain, a great difference in the sensitivity of various insect species, significant effect of different quantity of grain on the effectiveness and the current prices of natural essential oils on the market. Very high prices of essential oils, considering other characteristics (scent, sorption, penetration, aeration, etc.), may be really a very serious limiting factor for the application of natural essential oils in practice. There are two possible solutions to overcome the mentioned limiting factor;significant reduction of the prices of natural EO, or the production of the active components of natural EO synthetically.