Pests are any of the various organisms, e.g. fungi, insects, rodents and plants, that can harm crops or livestock or otherwise interfered with well being of humans.
Therefore, control management programme are created and implemented against a wide array of organisms living in highly diverse environment.
It is an ecosystem based strategy that focuses on long term prevention of pests or their damage through a combination of techniques such as biological control, habitat modification, modification of cultural practices and use of resistant varieties.
Chemical control such as pesticide are used only as support tools only and they are never the primary control option. While biological control may involve pathogens, parasites or predators.
The management seeks to achieve economical control of pest injury while keeping hazards to a minimum by coordinating pest management activities with recommended crop production practices.
The term Integrated Pest Management was used for the first time by Smith and van dan Bosch in 1967 and the term was officially recognized by the United States National Academy of Sciences in 1969.
Integrated pest management
