Introduction

This series of presentations is concerned with identifying key system concepts that are critical to designing and implementing successful IPM programs (note that a number of these concepts can be found in Norton and Mumford, 1993).  The Main purpose in reviewing these key concepts is to provide you with a set of “Tools for thinking about IPM”.  

The first key concept or thinking tool suggests that one reason for the failure of IPM projects is that they are designed without taking into account all the important factors affecting the problem.  Thus, as well as serving to pull together the topics covered in previous lectures, these key concepts could provide a useful framework and checklist to help you in the subsequent exercise of designing an IPM research plan that is likely to take into account all the main factors and so increase the likelihood of successful implementation.  

The following 15 key concepts (or tools for thinking about IPM) will be covered (including examples to illustrate):

1. Two main reasons for IPM project failure

2. Pest Management as a Natural Hazard

3. Economic concepts

4. Economic threshold concept

5. Pest damage relationships

6. Ecological concepts

7. Pay-off matrix and risk attitude

8. Investment model

9. Decision models

10. Information gaps

11. Competency standards for IPM

12. Development pathways

13. Locking-in phenomena      

14. Key components and processes

15. Necessary condition for sustainable IPM