The Herbal Biopesticide
Reference Number: SSTCAC22019
Research Field: Medicinal plants / Herbal Biopesticide
Research Content:
The commonly used synthetic commercial pesticides on market leave their residues on the plants that are sprayed and also bio accumulate into the environmental resources as a result of run off. Therefore farmers and consumers of such accruing products have suffered several health challenges health . Many diseases such as allergy, asthma, cancers have occurred due to the use of synthetic pesticides which are found in many forms around us and the W.H.O. estimates about one million unintentional pesticide poisonings every year in the world. Also, these synthetic pesticides kill some species which can be helpful for crops like butterflies, bees, and other soil organisms.
Herbal pesticides come in as the best alternatives to alleviate such effects since they are effective only against the target pests, are biodegradable and most importantly are organic products that do not affect the quality of the product. More so, Herbal pesticides don’t cause health challenges to the consumer and the farmer. However, there are few herbal pesticides on the market and even those available are not easily accessed by farmers. In addition, the available herbal pesticides take long to kill the target pests. Their low activity is attributed to the poor extraction methods used in their preparation and most of them are made of single molecules. This low activity has made herbal pesticides less attractive to farmers. This project intends to make a herbal pesticide that is effective to the plant pests in a very short time, is eco-friendly and has no effects on human health.
Research Progress:
-so far, the formulation of the product is undergoing
-source of raw materials has been identified
-packaging materials identified
-the oil extractor purchased
Cooperation Needs:
-quality analysis of our product
-field trials of the product
-financial assistance
Benefits:
My team and I have innovated NEEM plus a herbal pesticide that is effective in 2-3 days and can easily be accessible. This is because NEEM plus contains a mixture of scientifically extracted actives from 3 different plants and this synergistic effect improves its performance. NEEM plus is made up of cold pressed neem oil obtained from neem seeds with other extracts from red pepper and garlic. Neem is used because it contains Azadirachtin that gives it the mitecide, fungicide and insecticide activity. Garlic also has bacterial, fungicidal, insecticidal, nematicidal and repellent properties while red pepper has pest repellent and insecticidal activity. By producing NEEM plus, we are providing an alternative to farmers who have been encouraged to undergo organic farming.