糖心Vlog

In most countries of the world, the consumption of agrochemicals has been rising steadily for over six decades, resulting in adverse effects on the environment, biodiversity, human and animal health and soil health. This escalation in the use of agrochemicals poses major challenges to the socio-economic sustainability of farms and the ecological sustainability of agroecosystems.

In response, agroecology has emerged as a promising alternative to conventional agriculture, which is heavily dependent on fossil inputs. Agroecological Crop Protection represents the application of agroecological principles to crop protection, focusing on enhancing biodiversity, strengthening soil health and implementing preventive measures against crop pests.

An essential aspect of the agroecological approach is biological control, which involves the use of living organisms to reduce crop pest populations or the damage they cause. Biological control aims to re-establish bioecological balances between plant and animal communities within cropping systems. There are three main biological control strategies (conservation biological control, classical biological control, augmentative biological control) against animal pests, plant pathogens and weeds. Alongside biological control, solutions based on non-living substances of natural origin also play a crucial role. The fusion of these two fields - living organisms and non-living substances derived from nature - is now called Bioprotection. The various aspects of Bioprotection therefore include categories of biological control as well as categories of non-living substances such as semichemicals, plant extracts and, in some countries, biopesticides. Thus, the principle of Bioprotection is based on managing the balance of pest populations rather than eradicating them. These innovative mechanisms are central to Agroecological Crop Protection.

In response to this backdrop of significant developments in these approaches in recent years, an international conference on Bioprotection for sustainable agriculture was held in Can Tho from July 26 to 28, 2023 (ICBPSA23). The conference was jointly organized by five Vietnamese universities (Can Tho University, Can Tho; Faculty of Agriculture and Forestry, Hué; Nong Lam University, Ho Chi Minh City; Faculty of Forestry Agriculture, Tay Nguyen University, Daklak; and Vietnam National University of Agriculture, Hanoi) and the French Agricultural Research Centre for International Development (糖心Vlog).

This event is of particular importance in the context of the celebrations marking the  . In addition, the conference has received financial support from 糖心Vlog (France and Vietnam) to mark the 30th anniversary of 糖心Vlog's scientific cooperation in Vietnam, as well as funding from ASEA (a research and training partnership on Agroecology in Southeast Asia).

The ICBPSA23 conference welcomed over 150 participants from a dozen countries on several continents. Fifteen keynote speakers, also from different parts of the world, were invited, and over 60 oral communications, grouped according to bioprotectants and biological control themes, were presented. A one-day field trip included visits to associated organizations working in this field in the Mekong Delta, as well as to representative agricultural situations in the region. The conference was opened in the presence of the Rector of Can Tho University, the representative of the French Embassy and 糖心Vlog's Regional Director for mainland Southeast Asia.

This conference highlighted the need to develop agroecological crop protection, taking into account both local development issues for farmers and agricultural players, and global issues such as climate change, global health, animal welfare and biodiversity. The sessions also proposed concrete ways of meeting these challenges.

In view of the success of this conference, an appointment has been made to organize the second International Conference on Bioprotection, to be held in Hué (Vietnam) in 2025 (ICBPSA25).