Invasive pests in India

Invasive pest species have the potential to develop rapidly and spread in a new area to cause significant crop loss and can adversely affect food security. In India, a total of 25 species of invasive pests are recorded from 1889 to till date. Most of the invasive pests had outbreak and destroyed the crops, because they came into India without their natural enemies. Therefore, exploration should be made in the areas of origin of the pests or efforts should be made to search some effective natural enemies in the invaded area so that the pest population could be curtailed within Economic Threshold Level There is a need for interdisciplinary coordinated work among scientists, in identifying invaded organisms and in assessing their ecological problems, environmental concerns in different ecosystems, economic damage and sustainable management by prevention, eradication and control. Hence, it is necessary to know the recent invasive pests to protect the crops from economic loss.