Biological Control of Coffee Leaf Pests
Summary
Coffee leaf crops worldwide are threatened by a suite of herbivorous insects, most notably the coffee leaf miner and various mite species, which undermine leaf integrity, reduce photosynthetic capacity and impair yields. Reliance on chemical insecticides has led to resistance, non‐target impacts and environmental contamination, driving the search for sustainable alternatives. Biological control harnesses the natural enemy complex—parasitoids, predatory mites, lacewings and social wasps—to regulate pest populations in a self‐perpetuating manner.
Strategies for biological control span conservation, augmentation and habitat manipulation. Conservation biological control seeks to protect and enhance resident enemies through landscape management, such as maintaining forest fragments or intercropping plants that act as reservoirs for predatory arthropods. Augmentation introduces or mass‐releases agents like specialised parasitoids to bolster suppression efforts. These approaches are most effective when integrated into a broader pest management framework that combines cultural practices, resistant cultivars and judicious chemical use to maintain pests below economic thresholds.
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Biological Control of Coffee Leaf Pests publication trend
The graph below shows the total number of articles in biological control of coffee leaf pests across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).
Technical terms
Biological control: Use of living organisms to suppress pest populations below damaging levels.
Parasitoid: Insect whose larval stage develops in or on a host insect, ultimately causing the host’s death.
Conservation biological control: Enhancement of existing natural enemy populations through habitat and resource management.
Integrated pest management: Coordinated combination of biological, cultural, physical and chemical methods to control pests in an economically and ecologically sound manner.
Predatory mite: Mite species that feed on pest arthropods, contributing to natural regulation of pest densities.
Intercropping: Cultivation of two or more plant species together to support biodiversity and ecosystem services, including pest regulation.
References
- Intercropped Plants Provide a Reservoir of Predatory Mites in Coffee Crop. Agriculture (2023).
- Morphometric variation and fluctuating asymmetry in populations of Closterocerus coffeellae (Ihering) (Hymenoptera: Eulophidae) in different management and landscape of coffee agroecosystems. Biological Control (2024).
- A Comprehensive Review of the Coffee Leaf Miner Leucoptera coffeella (Lepidoptera: Lyonetiidae)—A Major Pest for the Coffee Crop in Brazil and Others Neotropical Countries. Insects (2021).
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