Journal des sciences agricoles et de la recherche alimentaire
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Can Production of Biocontrol Agent from Waste Biomass Maximize Waste Utilization?

Ratul Kumar Das, Saurabh Jyoti Sarma, Satinder Kaur Brar and Mausam Verma

In the recent times, eco-friendly pest management for sustainable crop production has gained tremendous importance as a potential alternative to agrochemicals for controlling plant pathogens. This has eliminated the hazards of conventional chemical pesticides on the environment and non-target organisms and also slashed the production cost. This approach is being adapted world over and found to be highly compatible with sustainable agriculture and effective against array of soil borne plant pathogens. Biocontrol agents (BCAs), such as Trichoderma sp., Pseudomonas sp., Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) and others play a major role in achieving the targets of Integrated Pest Management Programme (IPMP). However, for large scale production of BCAs, cost effective formulations is the major goal of IPMP. The issue has been well addressed by the use of different wastes (e.g. household waste, vegetable waste, sugarcane baggase, fruit juice wastes, winery wastes and waste from wastewater treatment plants) as substrates for the mass production of the BCAs. These wastes are otherwise a major concern of pollution and disposal as well.