Project: Citrus Plant Health Monitoring Plan

In 2004, the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food of the Valencia Regional Government established the Community Citrus Plant Health Monitoring Plan, through Decree 120/2004 of 16 July.

TRAGSATEC was commissioned to implement the tasks related to the field interventions mentioned in the Decree.

The objectives of these field interventions under the Plant Health Monitoring Plan are as follows:

-Establish a procedure for detecting the potential introduction of organisms of economic importance, recently introduced or so far undetected in the Valencian Community.
-Establish procedures for intervention in case of detection
-Define the optimal time for treatment of present species of interest to the sector, by monitoring populations and thus promoting the rational use of plant health products

To detect these organisms, the citrus area of Valencian Community (about 180,000 ha) was divided into 100 homogeneous zones where the following activities are carried out:

-Installation, checking and maintenance, in 100 areas, of a set of 8 traps to capture different exotic pests (1 fixed point per zone).
-Establishment of observation points at the possible entry points for exotic pests (ports, airports, warehouses importing fruit...) for early detection. The same as at the fixed points, installation and periodic checking of 8 different types of traps.
-Surveying at randomly selected points, where visual observations are made to extend controls to other organisms that cannot be detected by trapping.

When an official laboratory can confirm a presence, TRAGSATEC technicians have the task of implementing surveys in order to identify the affected area and set specific traps, if they exist in the market, for newly discovered species for the purpose of identifying population levels in the affected areas.

Tragsatec has carried out these tasks since 2004.