Winchester, United Kingdom
February 23, 2007
Exosex CM takes 70% less time
to install and costs 70% less than alternative mating disruption
techniques
Exosect, a leading provider
of environmentally conscious insect pest control today announced
compelling field trial results and strong commercial interest in
its Auto-Confusion products, following its annual two-day
distributor meeting held in Waterloo, Belgium last week.
Attended by Exosect’s European distributors the event was used
to share best practice in the pioneering Auto-Confusion
technique.
Figures published from field trials in New Zealand, revealed
that deployment time of Exosect’s auto-confusion product Exosex
CM for codling moth took 70% less time and consequently cost 70%
less than alternative products in terms of application
overheads. Similar successes were discussed by Agro Research
International B.V in The Netherlands where deployment time of
Exosex dispensers was calculated at 45 minutes per hectare and
by Massimo Benuzzi of Intrachem Bio who reported the application
time of an alternative mating disruption product at 6 hours per
hectare.
With new figures demonstrating the time and cost efficiencies of
Exosex CM, Ton Besseling of Mabeno in The Netherlands emphasised
the scope of the codling moth issue in the region and the
commercial opportunity for Exosect, “Within six years growers in
The Netherlands have gone from having to spend very little on
controlling codling moth to now spending approximately €300-€600
per hectare.” He added, “There are times during the season when
growers cannot spray. The benefit of Exosex CM is that it works
24 hours a day."
During the event Exosect provided a review of other markets that
Exosex Auto-Confusion technology is benefiting, this included a
presentation by the Hygiene Group Ltd, a hygiene and pest
control company that described how its trials in the indoor
confectionery environment were progressing. David Maxwell
explained, “In our trials, the moth population across the whole
confectionery site has been reduced to a low background level.
This enables us to pinpoint exact sources of infestation, which
means that we can shut down and clean a specific area or piece
of machinery without having to close down the entire production
line, which saves a lot of potential down time."
Technical Manager at Intrachem Bio (Italy), Massimo Benuzzi,
explained an additional benefit of the Exosex Auto-Confusion
technique, compared to traditional mating disruption techniques,
“When monitoring pest populations using traditional mating
disruption, growers have to look for trap shutdown which means
that they must have faith that no moths in the monitoring traps
means there are no moths in the crop. With Exosex
Auto-Confusion, trap shutdown does not occur so growers can
still monitor the curve and peak of moth numbers and take a
decision to treat hotspots if required."
Managing Director of Exosect, Martin Brown concludes, “Sharing
the success stories of Exosect product usage among our European
based collaborators is vital for both commercial development and
assisting in the fine tuning of our extensive 2007 trials
programme. We have already seen production increase by 300% this
year and the feedback from this event indicates that this figure
is set to grow further.”
The Exosect event was attended by Kenogard SA (Spain), Ceranova
(Austria), Omya (Switzerland), Mabeno (Netherlands), Makteshim
Agan (France), Intrachem Bio (Italy) Intrachem Bio (Germany),
Makhteshim Agan (Israel), Boyut FT (Turkey) and Selectis
(Portugal), Agro Research International B.V. (Netherlands). The
next Exosect annual distributor conference is planned for
February 2008.
Exosect Limited was formed in 2001 to commercialise
innovative pest control technology developed at the Southampton
University’s School of Biological Sciences. Focussing primarily
on R&D, Exosect has developed a range of delivery systems based
on the concept of attractants and active ingredients formulated
with patented powder carrier systems. Specialising in IPM based,
environmentally acceptable pest control products, markets
include crop protection (agriculture and horticulture), stored
product, amenity landscape and public health. |
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