Author(s): Damtew Abewoy
Potato is the fourth major crop of the world after rice, wheat and maize. However, in Ethiopia, the yield per unit area of potato is very low compared to those of other countries. There are many factors that reduce the yield of the crop among which the diseases like late blight and insect like tuber moth which play an important role in reduction of the yield. Hence, the objective of this review is to review the importance of these late blight and tuber moth of potato and their management in Ethiopia. In Ethiopia, late blight is occurs throughout the major potato production areas and researches have made estimates of losses ranging from 6.5 to 61.7%, depending on level of susceptibility of the varieties. Different types of management options like cultural, Fungicide Use, biological and Resistant Cultivars are the major management practices which can help in reducing late blight effect. However, because of its new strain development, there is no single effective management strategy of this disease. Therefore adopting integrated disease management approach is the most effective, environmentally safe and low costly to the users. In addition to late blight, potato tuber moth can also cause significant yield loss to potato. Potato tuber moth is the most important constraints of potato production in Ethiopia and it causes up to 42% yield loss in storage. Using different integrated pest management approaches including appropriate cultural practices, using pheromone traps, using biological control, host plant resistant, using botanicals and appropriate rate and time of chemical applications are used for reducing the damage of potato tuber moth.
