Agriculture Dept Working To Weed Out Fruit Fly

MULTAN, (Muzaffargarh.City – 16th Augst,2016) : Fruit and Vegetable section of Agriculture department is working on fruit fly management through non-conventional way,with the objective to improve of quality of fruits and save farmers from economic losses. Deputy Director, Fruit and Vegetable Nazeer Bhatti said this here on Tuesday while talking to APP.

He informed that Fruit & Vegetable section installed special traps containing methyl eugenol and protein hydrolysate to control fruit flies in mango, guava and citrus orchards. Under this project, 10 blocks of orchards,each comprising 10 acres were selected in 10 different tehsils of four districts including Muzaffargarh,Rajanpur,Lodhran,and Bahawalnagar.The department was taking data of flies on weekly basis to evaluate the utility of the project.

He said wooden boxes of two inches square containing methyl eugenol are located at each plant.

These attract female flies while traps of protein hydrolysate were used to control male flies. The traps have the ability to attract flies from area of 1.5 kilometres,he said.

About expenses on these traps, he informed that Agriculture Extension and Fruit & Vegetable section were bearing the cost jointly. “The basic aim is to create awareness amongst masses how to control fruit flies”.

About impact of the traps, the official informed that losses have decreased remarkably to 4 to 5 percent only, as compared to 40 to 80 percent losses observed in previous years at these orchards. Earlier,the growers were facing 40 percent fruit loss on early varieties while 80 percent losses on late varieties of different fruits,he concluded.