Smallholder farmers are the mainstay of the agricultural economies of sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), where they produce several crops, predominantly centered on maize. Smallholder productivity remains limited resulting from a range of confounding factors, but a primary cause is loss from pests and diseases, particularly insects. To improve productivity, recommendations for the mitigation of crop loss globally include early-warning and management systems for in-season indigenous pests. There are many early-warning systems in temperate regions; however, such systems are poorly established in Africa. This is in part due to the need for a combination of pest modeling, data handling and dissemination infrastructure, capacity, and resource provision. While each of these components is progressing in Africa, the means to successfully deploy such systems remain limited. To bridge this, the development of the Pest Risk Information Service (PRISE) began in 2017 for farmers in SSA. Implemented in Kenya, Ghana, Malawi, and Zambia, PRISE developed temperature-driven phenology models for major maize, bean, and tomato pests. Using downscaled and processed Earth Observation data to drive the models, PRISE partnered with African national agencies to communicate pre- and in-season pest alerts that forecast the time to act against key insect pests. Alerts were designed to be integrated into country-specific Good Agricultural Practice (GAP) recommendations to provide a complementary package to agricultural stakeholders. End line studies with farmers showed that those who received information about the target crops including PRISE pest forecasts, generally reported better outcomes in terms of reduced losses and increased incomes compared with farmers who did not.

Sorghum grain yield is highly reduced by birds in most areas in Africa where these avian pests are abundant. After much consideration on the physiological maturity of the sorghum grain, we designed an approach of early harvest of sorghum grain. The late grain soft dough was identified as the suitable stage to harvest white sorghum as it turns cream white. As the results showed it was possible to salvage over 90% of the grain yield even when high bird infestations were observed in the production plots. A test on seed germination rate showed over 80% grain viability after sun-drying the grain in the open in three different study sites. These results give hope and provide relief on sorghum production where birds are a menace.

The objective of this study was to carry out a large survey in order to characterize Phytoseiidae species diversity on cassava in Kenya. A total of 29 species from 10 genera were identified in diverse ecological zones in Kenya. The warm-to-hot low midlands of eastern and the warm-humid coastal strip yielded over 70 % of the species identified. The dominant species were Euseius fustis (Pritchard and Baker) and Typhlodromalus aripo De Leon present in 37 and 34 % of samples, respectively. Typhlodromalus aripo was found persistent in coastal, eastern and western regions of Kenya while E. fustis was present in all sampled localities of the country. In addition to morphological diagnosis, molecular sequences for DNA fragments 12S, CytB, COI and ITS, were obtained for T. aripo and E. fustis. Molecular diagnosis has revealed the unexpected presence of Neoseiulus idaeus Denmark and Muma and indicated its misidentification as Neoseiulus onzoi (Zannou, Moraes and Oliveira) in a previous survey carried out in Kenya. Molecular sequences herein obtained will help further diagnosis of phytoseiid species and complement the international reference databases needed to assist molecular identification of Phytoseiidae species.

Tea agro ecosystems are least disturbed in comparison to other crop systems due to the plant canopy type. A survey on predacious mites’ abundance and impact on leaf yield in different tea production areas was carried out in 2014-2015 in Kenya. Major pest species were the red spider mite Oligonychus coffeae and the yellow thrip, Scirtothrips dorsalis. The red crevice mite, Brevipalpus phoenicis was found in few areas and in low numbers. Predacious mites of Phytoseiidae Family were highest at 5.8 and 6.8 mites per sample during dry and wet seasons, respectively. Phytoseiid abundance during the dry and wet seasons did not differ much within most sample sites. Presence of phytoseiid mites in combination with NPK-fertilizer-high altitude led to the strongest correlation to leaf yield than any other combination variable. High phytoseiid density- high altitude was third with positive impact to yield increase after high altitude combined with NPK-fertilizer. The findings here show contributory positive impact of phytoseiids in tea leaf yield in an agro eco-system.