Perfume to replace pesticides in beet fields? “All the difference with the pesticides is that smells do not kill”: in their laboratory in Rennes, Ené Leppik, co -Founder of the French agroidary young man, invents with his perfume team looking for cultures.
In three years, the company has developed a biocontrol product called insior that offers very promising results against the green aphid, the vector of the sugar beet jaundice that can lead to up to 30% of the loss of harvest.
In the treated fields, “aphid populations are half reduced: they are disturbed, they eat less and reproduce less (…), we break the exponential reproduction in the plot,” explains the researcher, scientific director of Agrosio.
The team, which brings together ethologists, entomologists, agronomists and chemicals, has developed an “olfactory strategy”: studying the behavior of the green aphid to determine the odors that do not like, before making the cocktail that will scare it.
Laboratory work
But how to capture a smell? Everything happens in the Agriodor Analytical Laboratory in Rennes. The plants emit “traces” odors. To take them, the Marie Gresle technique creates a closed space around the plant: a kind of small cage surrounded by transparent plastic.
The cage air is pumped and headed on a resin cartridge, where smells will be fixed. A solvent allows them to recover and analyze, in particular using a mass spectrometer. This is where the aroma becomes figures. We can identify and quantify the molecules that make up odors.
To prove their discoveries, the agroiders of the green aphids, the flies and other crop pests. Therefore, work has been launched in the Drosophila Suzukii, which attacks cherries, or in trips, called stormy wheat. Several experiences allow studying their appetite or disgust for each of the molecules.
“A smell of hot wine”
The insior repellent that Mysus Persicae distance, the beet peanuts, is a concentrate of different molecules synthesized in mini granules, which will extend at a speed of four kilograms per hectare.
The recipe, secret, contains nails and basil. A farmer recognizes “the smell of hot wine.”
Authorized in 2024 by repeal in 500 hectares, mainly in France, but also in the United Kingdom and Germany, this repellent has been distributed for a few months by Syngenta: the world pesticide giant, which seeks to expand its palette of biocontrol products, praise “the innovative approach” of the agiodor.
The bets are high for industrial crops: France is the second European beet sugar producer, behind Germany, and exports approximately 2.4 million tons of sugar annually, almost half of its production.
It is in particular to preserve this sugar sector that certain agricultural unions demand re -authorization in France of a very toxic neonicotinoid insecticide for pollinators. This reintroduction is provided by a bill that arrives on Monday at the National Assembly.
Find alternatives
But for the farmer Benoit Ambness, who proves the insior in his beet fields of Pas-de-Calais, there is no doubt about “returning.”
It uses the insior “as a preventive”: by clicking the plant to feed on sap, the insect disturbs photosynthesis and, therefore, sugar production. The plant is sensitive when it develops its first leaves. But beyond 12 leaves, culture is “strong enough” to support the assault. Is this product an alternative to conventional pesticides?
“The problem is that (neonicotinoids) also kill aphid predators. With our olfactory solution, we prevent or delay the invasion of the aphids and this gives time to their natural predators, such as the ladybug or the Syrphs, to arrive,” he explains, defending a “holistic approach.”
Source: BFM TV
