Balancing fungicide performance on disease control and physiological benefits against resistance risks

摘要

Several fungicide groups, including azoles, strobilurins and succinate dehydrogenase inhibitors (SDHIs) produce direct and indirect physiological changes when applied to crop plants for the control of a range of diseases. These changes can result in yield increases which may encourage the use of such fungicides for reasons other than disease control. The paper discusses whether this practice could increase the risk of fungicide resistance development, particularly in relation to the SDHI fungicide group. The use of SDHI fungicides in programmes with azoles will improve disease control and give higher yields but importantly, provide an anti-resistance strategy to help protect the azoles (and the SDHIs) from resistance development. Limiting the use ofSDHIs may prolong the useful life of this fungicide group, but in doing so may put the azoles at further risk of resistance development, deprive farmers of improved levels of disease control and reduce yield performance.