A global research has found that four of the world's most destructive agricultural pests are actually one and the same.
For twenty years some of the world's most damaging pest fruit flies have been almost impossible to distinguish from each other. The ability to identify pests is central to quarantine, international trade, pest management and basic research.
In 2009 a research effort coordinated by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) set out to definitively answer this question by resolving the differences, if any, between four of the most destructive fruit flies: the Oriental fruit fly, the Philippine fruit fly, the Invasive fruit fly and the Asian Papaya fruit fly. These species cause incalculable damage to horticultural industries and food security across Asia, Africa and the Pacific.
IAEA said Friday that these studies conclusively demonstrated that all the four fruit flies are all the same biological species and have now been combined under the single name: Bactrocera dorsalis or the Oriental fruit fly.
Lead author, Dr. Mark Schutze from the Plant Biosecurity Cooperative Research Centre (PBCRC) and the Queensland University of Technology (QUT), believes that the integrated multidisciplinary nature of the project leaves little doubt that the species are identical. "More than 40 researchers from 20 countries examined evidence across a range of disciplines, using morphological, molecular, cytogenetic, behavioural and chemoecological data to present a compelling case for this taxonomic change", he said.
"This outcome has major implications for global plant biosecurity, especially for developing countries in Africa and Asia", said Dr. Schutze.
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