Economic gains and Integrated Pest Management: An application to the Sclerotinia and the Canola crop

Abstract: Agronomic experimental data are used for simulating some economic implications linked to an integrated pest management applied to Sclerotinia stem rot in France. This integrated pest management is a diagnostic test allowing farmers to reduce their fungicide application for canola. Profit estimations for farmers are used for determining whether or not farmers would adopt this integrated pest management. Before 2007, simulations show that the use of a Sclerotinia diagnostic test provides economic gains for farmers slightly lower than the common used practice of preventive spraying of fungicides. However, the canola price increased in 2007 makes the diagnostic test less attractive for farmers compared to the systematic fungicide application. Various political scenarios including a test subsidy or an insurance program linked to the diagnostic test are examined. We show that both instruments would lead to the use of the diagnostic test, even if, for the regulator, the test subsidy is less costly than the insurance program linked to the diagnostic test.