Demonstration on Management of Tomato Pinworm (Tuta absoluta L.) in Khammam District of Telangana, India

The front – line demonstrations were conducted in 30 farmer fields during three consecutive year’s i.e 2019-2021 in Khammam district. In tomato cultivation pinworm was major pest especially during summer months. For management of  these pest the following IPM practices were  suggested to farmers i.e the installation of pheromone traps, collection and destruction of infested parts and spraying of Azadirachtin 10000 ppm 2-3 ml/lit 30 days after transplanting. Spraying of Emamectin Benzoate @ 0.4 g/ lit 10 days after first spray. Spraying of Rynaxpyr @ 0.3 ml/lit 10 days after the second spray was effective. The mean of the parameters in 30 demonstrations during three years (pooled) revealed that the percentage of leaf damage was 9.98% in demo field and 19.85 % in farmers’ practice. The percentage of fruit damage 13.21% in demonstrated plots whereas 22.57% in case of check plots. Average fruit weight was high in demo plots i.e 65.11 g when compared with check plots i.e 52.71 g. Higher marketable fruit yield  (60.08 t/ha) and 9.95 % yield increase were noted  in the demo field over farmers practice (54.67 t/ha) with a benefit -cost ratio of 2.68:1 and 2.23:1, respectively. It also observed that higher gross returns (430450/ha) and net returns (269552/ha) were recorded in the demo field than farmer’s practice (395250 /ha and 218336/ha, respectively). The technology gap and extension gap enumerated from this study ranged 10.93 t/ha to 18.88 t/ha and 4.12-6.74 t/ha respectively with the technology index of 19.89 % during an average of three consecutive years. The pinworm incidence was high during March. The results clearly showed that the positive impact of front-line demonstrations over farmer’s practices towards increasing productivity and reducing the cost of cultivation of tomatoes.