Integrated Pest Management (IPM) for Food Processing Plants
A Sustainable Approach to Pest Control
Integrated pest management is the practice of controlling pests with environmentally friendly strategies that minimizes the use of pesticides with a sustainable approach and reduces the cost of pest control in food processing plants. The food processing plants include milling grains, oil units, baking and cooking canning, dehydration, freezing, and many other such facilities. Common pests in these facilities include rodents, cockroaches, flies, ants, and stored product pests (e.g., beetles, moths). These pests can cause contamination, damage to goods, and safety issues, making effective pest management crucial.
What is Integrated Pest Management (IPM) and are there four important key steps involved in it?
IPM is not just one strategy or method to control insect pests; it involves all the tactics available according to the situation in a given facility to control insect pests in a more environmentally friendly, long-term, economic, and sustainable way. IPM in food processing involves monitoring, identification, prevention from entry, actions, and control measures.
There are several key steps involved in IPM.
1. Monitoring and Identification:
The first and most important step in any IPM strategy is to identify the pest and then monitor it. The pest is monitored with traps and physical observation in the area by an expert identifier. After identifying specific pests in the area, further monitoring is carried out. The identified pest is then monitored with specific monitoring devices such as lures, traps, cameras, scanners, drones, etc.
2. Prevention from entering the area:
The next step after identifying and monitoring is to prevent the pest from entering the food processing unit. If a pest is entering from any opening, we should close it, such as doors, windows, holes, and cracks. Traps are also useful to highlight the area of entry. If we place 10 traps in a facility and traps from a window capture more pests, it means the area of the entry of that pest is from the window. So we will cover the window with an insect-proof net or any other suitable material for that facility.
3. Action Thresholds:
If we cannot stop pests from entering our food processing unit, we will check if the damage to the pest is below the economic threshold level. We will take preventive measures and not use pesticides or chemicals.
4. Control Measures:
If we cannot stop pests from entering our food processing unit, we will check if the damage to the pest is below the economic threshold level. We will take preventive measures and not use pesticides or chemicals.
IPM Techniques for Food Processing Plants
1. Sanitation of the food processing unit:
The first step in developing an IPM technique after evaluation is sanitation and cleanliness. Sanitation can remove most of the pests from the facility. The sanitation of the structures involves schedule cleaning, waste management, and design of our facility.
- Cleaning Schedules: The cleaning should be scheduled according to the operations performed in the structure and structure of the facility. Try to clean the area when there are no operations carried out in the processing unit.
- Waste Management: After the cleaning process, the waste has to be disposed of properly. No waste should be left open; it should be covered properly. The waste should be stored separately; don’t mix food waste with plastic and other glassware wastes.
- Facility Design: Sanitation is performed according to the design of the unit or food processing plant. Some facilities are designed in such a way that sanitation can be done even if it is operational, while other operations carried out have to be stopped first.
2. Exclusion Methods
The pest should not be allowed to enter the processing unit. To avoid the entry of pests, the area is sealed with different types of sealing, curtains, and screens.
- Sealing Entry Points: The pest entry points should be sealed in the processing unit. For example, if rats can enter through holes and cracks in the walls or floors, these cracks and holes should be sealed properly to stop the entry of the rats.
- Air Curtains: To avoid flying pests entering from doors and windows, air curtains should be installed. It will prevent entry of the insects and other pests, which can be harmful for the plant.
- Screens: Use screens to make the processing facility pest-proof on windows and doors or on other such openings and entry points.
3. Monitoring and Detection
Monitoring and detection is the most important step in an IPM plant to control the pests. To monitor pests, pheromone traps, glue boards, and light traps are used. Moreover, other than these devices, routine inspection is also carried out.
4. Biological Control
After the application of all these strategies, if the pest population is still increasing, then we go for biological pest control methods. It involves the use of biopesticides such as pyrethrin and other plant-based pesticides that are extracted from the plants. The can repel the pests from the processing unit. Predators and parasitoids are also used to control the pests by killing them or damaging them. The biological pest control method is more environmentally friendly as compared to chemical pesticides and fumigation.
5. Chemical Control
Chemical pesticides are the last option in an IPM planning triangle. We go for the chemical control method when all the previous methods don’t work or the pest population is still increasing. For example, poison baits are used to kill rats. Targeted insecticides are also used with their minimal use to control pests in an environmentally friendly way.
Challenges in Pest Management for Food Processing Plants
Food processing plants are mostly operational, and raw materials are moving always, so it is difficult to apply for the pest management practices in these units.
These plants face strict laws from food safety and food departments; if they fail to comply with these laws and regulations, they might get a high penalty, or even sometimes they can get sealed. So they should follow IPM more strictly to overcome pests, pest residue, and contamination caused by the pests.
Benefits of IPM for Food Processing Plants
IPM is the most sustainable and environmentally friendly way to control insect pests, rodents, and other pests. Following are the benefits of using IPM in food processing plants:
- The risk of contamination from the pests is reduced in the processing unit.
- Easy to follow the government and food organizations laws and regulations.
- The IPM is hard and costly to start, but later on it becomes cost-effective and helps companies save on the cost of pest control in the long term.
- If a processing plant follows IPM and sanitation more strictly, its reputation is improved, and it gets positive feedback from the customers, hence more customers and more sales of the produce.
