Pests and Diseases: PQSI’s Ongoing Battle to Protect Zimbabwe’s Crops

By Regina Pasipanodya

In a concerted effort to enhance the agricultural landscape of Zimbabwe, the Plant Quarantine Services Institute (PQSI) plays a pivotal role in safeguarding the nation’s plant health. 

Recently, Ms. Jacqueline Tanhara from the Ministry of Land, Agriculture, Water Fisheries and Rural Development conducted an enlightening interview with Mrs. Louisa Makumbe, the Head of PQSI. 

The Plant Quarantine Services Institute (PQSI) is a significant player in making Zimbabwe’s agriculture better. The Institute is fully committed to the cause of keeping the plant health of the nation safety and sound. 

The discussion shed light on the institute’s mandate, the current threats to agriculture, and the strategies in place to combat emerging pests and diseases.

The Plant Quarantine Services Institute in the sphere of managing the complexity of pests focuses on three pillars, namely, monitoring, education, and collaboration.

With this mission in mind, the Ministry of Land, Agriculture, Water Fisheries and Rural Development recently introduced the nation to the insightful conversation that took place between Mrs. Louisa Makumbe, the Head of PQSI, and Ms. Jacqueline Tanhara. The main focus of the discussion was the institute’s mandate on the current threats to agriculture, and the strategies to prevent the extension. 

Louisa Makumbe highlighed that one of the objectives of PQSI, a unit of the Agricultural Research, Innovation and Specialist Services Directorate, is the continuous detection and monitoring of emerging pests and diseases. 

The institute plays a pivotal role in the provision of timely and accurate information for protecting both the environment and agriculture in that country. This includes the development of plant health standards for trade as well as for agriculture products. 

Also she said that drugs and technology are delivered by several branches including operations, diagnostics, surveillance, and plant import regulation. The mission of the operations branch is to provide assistance and facilitate the process of importing and exporting plant products, issuing the needed phytosanitary certificates and ensuring that the imports are compliant with the import conditions as stipulated by the trading parties.

“Surveillance is the primary measure of maintaining pests’ and diseases’ records, whereas diagnostics determine the cause of the problem in the field accurately.However, the department has been having a rough time as far as emerging pests and diseases are concerned, and this is all aggravated by the changing global weather pattern,” said Makombe.

As stressed by Makumbe, lately the Fall Army Worm (FAW) and the Tomato Leaf Miner (Tuta absoluta) were the most affecting and persistent pests. Furthermore, indigenous pests like the False Codling Moth and the Mediterranean Fruit Fly are still posing equally risky threats. Regular monitoring and control are necessary to prevent these threats from causing damage all the time. 

“The institute is basically fighting a total of 14 pest species affecting food security, and the Maize Chlorotic Mottle Virus is one of them, causing Maize Lethal Necrosis (MLN). As Zimbabwe imports grains, it is critical to ensure that these pests do not come into the country in the first place.”

 “The same goes for potatoes where the Potato Cyst Nematodes and the Pepper RingSpot Virus are subjected to a 24 hour watch for any signs of their expansion.” 

“To eliminate these threats, PQSI brings up and supports Integrated Pest Management (IPM) strategies. Thus the farmers are strongly recommended to apply a combination of chemical, cultural, and biological controls. 

A detailed conversation with Mrs. Makumbe confirmed the effectiveness of the measures: “The implementation of Good Agricultural Practices (GAP) should be one of the components of the crop production plan. This includes maintaining good farm hygiene, timely pruning, and proper disposal of diseased materials by farmers” explained Makumbe.

The institute however, has realized the significance of having development and extension workers coinciding with each other. 

It has, therefore, set the trend where it involves the extension personnel in the process of information disbursal that touches on the plants which are healthy and solving the prevailing challenges with the rebellious torn up farmers. 

This then eases the application of findings that tackle the underlying problems, and thus research is looked upon as a mode of help that is alive with current situations in the agriculture sector.

“PQSI is resourceful in that while it is working on the coming in of electronic permits it is also doing a lot of other operations on the ground. 

Permit Management is the other part of the whole Electronic Single Window Program of which the former is a subset that will simplify the permit application process and enable the phytosanitary services to be handled online. The transition into the electronic systems paves the way for efficient and cost-effective agricultural trading as well as farming and agribusiness compliance.