Horticulture is one of the most important agricultural subsectors in Africa, providing income, creating employment opportunities, and enhancing food and nutritional security. However, tephritid fruit flies are responsible for both direct and indirect losses, with alien invasive species often having the most severe ecological and economic impact. In the past 20 years, systematic analysis of tephritids has provided comparative information on taxonomy, synonymy, and character-state differentiation. New molecular techniques are now available for identifying species, reconstructing phylogenies, and studying population genetic structures. Research on biology, host range and shifts, thermotolerance, and demography has provided useful information for developing predictive and ecological niche models to guide management methods. In recent years, the responses of various species to attractants have been documented. Several suppression methods, including the release of coevolved parasitoid species targeting invasives, have been promoted within the context of integrated pest management, leading to improvement in the quality and quantity of fruits and vegetables produced. However, there is still the need for wide-scale availability of these technologies to smallholder growers across Africa.

In sub-Saharan Africa, urban populations are projected to increase by 115% in the coming 15 years. In addition, economic growth and dietary shifts towards animal source foods have put high pressure and demand on agricultural production. The high ecological footprint of meat and dairy production, as well as high feed costs, prevent the livestock sector from meeting the increasing demand in a sustainable manner. Insects such as the black soldier fly (BSF) have been identified as potential alternatives to the conventionally used protein sources in livestock feed due to their rich nutrient content and the fact that they can be reared on organic side streams. Substrates derived from organic byproducts are suitable for industrial large-scale production of insect meal. Although efficient in waste management and in feed production, BSF larvae are very sensitive to the external environment such as temperature and rearing medium. Therefore, we studied the effect of temperature and substrate type, i.e., brewers’ spent grain (SG) and cow dung (CD), on the development and survival of BSF larvae. Both organic substrates were readily available in Nairobi, Kenya, the location of the experiments. In our experiment, 100 3–5-day-old BSF larvae were placed into containers that contained either SG or CD and further treated at temperatures of 15 °C, 20 °C, 25 °C, 30 °C, and 35 °C. The duration of larval development was recorded, and the prepupae were removed, weighed, and placed individually in separate, labeled, 35-mL plastic cups filled with moist sawdust. After emergence, 10 2-day-old adults (5 males and 5 females) from every replica per substrate were transferred into a cage (40 × 40 × 40 cm) and allowed to mate for 24 h at their respective temperatures. The laid egg batches were collected and counted, and the adult flies’ longevity was recorded. The data were subjected to a two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) using the general linear model procedure. BSF larvae reared on SG developed faster than those reared on CD; the former also favored higher temperatures for their larval development and emergence into adults. The optimum range was 25–30 °C. With increasing temperatures, the longevity of adult BSF decreased, while the fecundity of females increased. Thus, it is possible to take advantage of the readily available SG waste streams in the urban environments of Kenya to produce BSF larvae-derived livestock feed within a short duration of time and at relatively high temperatures.

Northwest Algeria has experienced fluctuations in rainfall between the two decades 1940s and 1990s from positive to negative anomalies, which reflected a significant decline in rainfall during the mid-1970s. Therefore, further analyzing rainfall in this region is required for improving the strategies on water resource management. In this study, we complement previous studies by dealing with sub basins that were not previously addressed in Tafna basin (our study area located in Northwest Algeria), and by including additional statistical methods (Kruskal–Wallis test, Jonckheere-Terpstra test, and the Friedman test) that were not earlier reported on the large scale (Northwest Algeria). In order to analyse the homogeneity, trends, and stationarity in rainfall time series for nine rainfall stations over the period 1979–2011, we have used several statistical tests. The results showed an increasing trend for annual rainfall after the break detected in 2007 for Djbel Chouachi, Ouled Mimoun, Sidi Benkhala stations using Hubert, Pettitt, and Buishand tests. The Lee and Heghinian test has detected a break at the same year in 2007 for all stations except Sebdou, Beni Bahdel, and Hennaya stations, which have a break date in 1980. We have confirmed this increasing trend for rainfall with other trend detection methods such as Mann Kendall and Sen’s method that highlighted an upward trend for all the stations in the autumn season, which is mainly due to an increase in rainfall in September and October. On a monthly scale, the date of rupture is different from one station to another because the time series are not homogeneous. In addition, we have applied three tests enabling further results: (i) the Jonckheere-Terpstra test has detected an upward trend for two stations (Khemis and Hennaya), (ii) Friedman test has indicated the difference between the mean rank again with Khemis and Hennaya stations and the Merbeh station, (iii) according to the Kruskal-Wallis test, there have been no variance detected between all the rainfall stations. The increasing trend in rainfall may lead to a rise in stream flow and enhance potential floods risks in low-lying regions of the study area.