The Boll Weevil Eradication Program in the USA

摘要

The boll weevil, Anthonomus grandis, is a serious cotton pest in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru, Venezuela and the USA. The Central American countries of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua plantedcotton on 467,000 hectares in 1977/78, and 119,000 hectares in 1987/88, but almost no cotton was planted in these countries in 1997/98. In 1977/78, at the time when cotton area was at its peak in the Central American countries, the average yield for theregion was 770 kg/ha, i.e., almost double the world average and 132% of the average yield in the USA. There were some individual countries with higher yields than the Central American region in 1977/78, but as a region, Central America was the highest yielding in the world. Ten years later, the average cotton yield for the region was 812 kg/ha, compared with the world average of 554 kg/ha. The average yield in Guatemala in 1987/88 was only 33 kg/ha less than Australia, and Guatemala was the third highest yielding country in the world after Israel and Australia. Guatemala and Nicaragua were the last countries in the region to abandon cotton production. When they ultimately stopped producing cotton in the early 1990s, yields in both countries were stillhigher than the world average. In fact, yields never dropped significantly in Central America, but the cost of production escalated due to insecticide applications against the boll weevil. The Central American countries were not able to find an economical way to control the boll weevil and so had to give up cotton production. Thus, unless economically feasible means are available to control it, the boll weevil is so serious that it can force countries to stop producing cotton.