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Over The Horizon

Beating a Rhino-sized Bug

New Zealand is exporting the results of one of its clean, green science techniques to Fiji to help the country beat a rhino-sized bug problem.

HortResearch has prepared a consignment of Oryctes baculovirus as part of a programme to control coconut palm rhinoceros beetle. The beetle is a major pest in Fiji, Tonga, Samoa and Papua New Guinea. It attacks the crown of the palm, causing severe damage and even death.

The only proven methods of control are plantation sanitation -- costly and often involving chemicals -- or the Oryctes baculovirus biocontrol method.

The problem is particularly bad in Fiji, as the area is prone to cyclone damage, and trees are being felled in large-scale plantation rehabilitation projects. The beetles breed in dead palms left to rot in the aftermath of cyclones or deliberate felling.

HortResearch's Natural Systems Group has shipped the virus to Fiji in aseptic vials, each containing sufficient virus to inoculate 20-50 beetles. They will then be released into plantations, to act as a natural means of dispersal.

"Oryctes baculovirus is one of the most successful viral biocontrol agents," says Dr Paul Scotti. "It is specific to the rhinoceros beetle, and has the advantage of retaining infectivity over several months at tropical temperatures if kept aseptic."

The Fiji government is so concerned about the problem that it had planned to set up its own laboratory virus production facility, despite the high costs involved.

HortResearch International Business Manager Bob Macfarlane, who made the initial contact with the Fiji Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forests, says "They were persuaded that a more cost effective solution would be to buy the virus from us on an annual basis, and this is what will happen."