1. Introduction
Date palm (
Phoenix dactylifera L.) is an important fruit crop in arid regions, such as the Arabian Peninsula, North Africa, and the Middle East [
1]. Saudi Arabia ranked third after Egypt and Iran in total date production in 2018, contributing 15% of all dates produced globally [
2]. Based on a report from Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Environment, Water, and Agriculture [
3], total date production was approximately 1.3 million tons and there are over 30 million date palm trees in the country, covering an area of 107,000 (ha). The date serves as an essential source of essential nutrients, especially dietary potassium [
4,
5]. Furthermore, it features several medicinal qualities, namely, anti-fungal, antibacterial, anti-tumor, anti-ulcer, and immunomodulatory properties [
6]. Although the number of palm trees in Saudi Arabia has increased, their average yield is lower than other date-producing countries [
7] due to the low yield potential of certain varieties, insect pests and plant diseases, and poor management practices [
8,
9].
Insect pests are a significant production constraint for palm dates in Saudi Arabia. The red palm weevil (RPW) (
Rhynchophorus ferruginous (Olivier), Coleoptera:
Curculionidae) has become the most devastating pest affecting date palm trees in several regions of the world, including Saudi Arabia [
9,
10,
11]. The RPW was first reported in the eastern region of Saudi Arabia in the mid-1980s [
1] and then spread to other areas through infested planting material being transported for farming and landscape gardening [
8,
12,
13]. Globally, RPWs affect nearly 40 palm species belonging to 23 different genera in more than 60 countries [
6,
14]. In Saudi Arabia, the estimated number of date palms infested by RPW has reached of 80,000 palms, costing over USD 8.69 million in economic losses for its management and eradication [
9,
15]. Therefore, serious and prompt action to eradicate RPWs should be implemented to enable the survival of palm trees and support the livelihood of palm growers [
16,
17].
Worldwide, the control of RPWs primarily relies on the use of synthetic pesticides [
18]. However, pesticides do not effectively manage RPWs, endanger biological diversity, and deteriorate environmental quality [
8,
18,
19]. Furthermore, due to increased concerns about the environmental and human health side effects of pesticides, there is growing demand to implement integrated pest management (IPM) [
20]. Currently, IPM is the primary paradigm in plant protection, approved by all stakeholders in the agricultural value chain to maintain pesticides and other interventions at levels that are ecologically and economically justified [
21,
22,
23]. The current RPW IPM strategy is comprised of periodic field surveys for detecting infestations, applying phyto-sanitation and agro-techniques (i.e., palm and field sanitation, elimination of hidden breeding sites, including abandoned date plantations, and palm injury prevention), preventive and curative chemical treatments, eradicating severely infested palms, implementing quarantine measures, and education and training [
1,
6,
16]. Undoubtedly, implementing an IPM strategy is not easy. Date palm growers are faced with various challenges in many countries, including a lack of efficient early detection methods, weak enforcement of quarantine measures, and uncontrolled movement of infested trees; an inability of biocontrol agents being efficiently delivered and sustained in field conditions; insufficient understanding of RPW field behavior among farmers; and a lack of knowledge of symptoms and adoption of management practices by farmers [
16,
24,
25].
Although many RPW preventive and curative measures are in place today, the failure to manage RPWs in most countries can be attributed mainly to a lack of awareness, knowledge, and adoption of these measures, as well as the weakness of systematic and coordinated control actions or management strategies that involve all stakeholders [
16,
26]. To effectively implement an IPM program for RPWs that suits small-scale farmers in developing countries, such as Saudi Arabia, addressing the lack of adequate information regarding farmers’ pest management knowledge, perceptions, and practices is crucial [
27,
28]. Such information is vital in developing participatory IPM and as a basis for the adaptation of pest management technologies by local farming systems [
29,
30]. Furthermore, determining knowledge and adoption gaps is useful for developing educational programs to train farmers, setting the research agenda, testing research hypotheses, designing extension strategies, and evaluating the effectiveness of projects and development interventions [
20,
25,
28,
31]. In light of the scarce research available in the area of assessing farmers’ knowledge and adoption of RPW management, the present study addresses this gap by achieving the following objectives: (i) clarifying farmers’ knowledge of RPW symptoms, (ii) identifying farmers’ adoption of management practices, and (iii) analyzing the nexus between farmers’ adoption of RPW IPM and their knowledge of symptoms.
4. Discussion
Developing the best management practices for RPW eradication is always a concern for researchers and farmers in various countries to increase productivity and ensure sustainable livelihoods. The adverse impacts of RPWs at the micro and macro levels have received much attention in the literature. The present study demonstrates that early detection and knowledge of symptoms and applying IPM are crucial for effective control and eradication. While farmers’ actual adoption rates for the RPW IPM have not previously been documented in Saudi Arabia, these findings are consistent with the country’s 2030 vision for developing an active policy for developing the palm sector by reducing RPW risks [
41].
Visual inspection for damage is the first step of an overall IPM strategy against RPW. Our findings show that the knowledge level of most farmers surveyed in this study regarding visual symptoms of RPW is low. This means that farmers face difficulties in visually detecting infestation during the various stages. This might be because farmers lack sufficient understanding of how RPWs cause damage and knowledge of their life cycle. In fact, the early detection of infestation and damage is difficult since palm trees do not show visual evidence of infection until the palm reaches a medium or an advanced stage of infestation [
16,
42]. According to Muriithi et al. [
43], one of the main principles of IPM is prevention by monitoring plants regularly and making accurate diagnoses by observing symptoms and learning the lifecycle and damage potential to facilitate decision-making about the best time to take action. Our results reveal that farmers rarely check palm trees at regular intervals to detect early infestation in this context. In other words, farmers do not keep in mind that prevention is better than cure. As the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) [
25] argued, detecting RPW infestation in its early stages can be achieved by conducting training programs for farmers to enhance their knowledge and skills on early detection and inspection methods. Furthermore, developing a reliable, easy-to-use, and cost-effective RPW detection device is an effective solution for reducing the gap in early detection [
44]. In this regard, the literature provides some successful examples of early detection techniques in terms of efficiency, ease of use, and cost-effectiveness, such as biological and physiological indicators, thermal imaging, chemical signatures, acoustics, laser-induced remote sensing, breakdown spectroscopy, and near-infrared spectroscopy [
9,
44,
45,
46,
47,
48,
49]. Additionally, the FAO established a global RPW management platform that includes a mobile app tool for collecting and transmitting data on palm inspection [
16]. However, maximizing the benefits from early detection techniques requires overcoming challenges such as improving farmers’ involvement in detecting RPW-infested palms, developing a uniform protocol for visual inspection, surveillance and monitoring, and using a geographic information system (GIS) platform to register the detection of infested palms [
16,
24,
25].
Calculation of adoption rates enabled an assessment of the extent to which respondents were practicing RPW IPM. Practically, in the present study, a medium variation in the farmers’ adoption of RPW IPM was observed. Specifically, farmers’ adoption had fallen to a low and moderate level for all practices under investigation. Given these adoption levels among Saudi Arabian palm farmers, it is more relevant to discuss the varying levels of IPM use rather than how to increase adoption in general. For the preventive category, however, despite the importance of directing efforts toward applying preventive measures for RPW control and eradication [
50], the rates of farmers’ adoption did not reach the high level. These rates could increase the percentages of RPW infestation as a result of non-adoption. This might be attributed to the lack of famers’ knowledge about the importance of preventive measures as the main component of the general IPM principles due to irregular contact with the local extension, as illustrated in
Table 1. The results indicate that farmers have good knowledge about not transferring infested trees or offshoots to non-infested areas and not allowing anyone to transfer infested offshoots from an infested farm as legislative measures. This might be due to the application of inspection points and agricultural quarantines between date palm production areas and farmers’ perception of legal penalties in case of violations. Other legislative measures, such as burying the infested palm far away after cutting it into small pieces, surveying RPW-infested palms, and not transferring the infested palm waste to another area, did not attract the same attention among farmers. This might be attributed to the fact that to perform these operations, many workers are required, and most farmers are preoccupied with producing dates without cleaning the farm and disposing or recycling waste.
The findings also highlight that the level of adopting cultural practices was above average. This might be due to those farmers performing these practices once at the beginning of the season or when establishing their palm farm. Some mechanical control practices are rarely implemented by farmers, such as covering the roots of small trees with soil to a height of 20 cm and scraping infested areas until the healthy tissue is exposed. This might be due to the fact that farmers do not have sufficient knowledge about the importance of these practices in preventing RPW attacks. In the same sense, however, the importance of removing of infested or dead trees and pruning products on neglected farms for RPW control and eradication was ranked last among other mechanical control measures. This might be due to the fact that farmers cannot do anything on abandoned farms where they are not the owners. Other possible explanations for this result can be due to farmers’ unwillingness to pay additional costs without any economic benefit and the absence of collective action by farmers’ associations in organizing efforts to manage infested trees on neglected farms. Regarding chemical control, IPM reduces pesticides by the application of a range of environmentally compatible methods. The adoption level of chemical control recommendations among farmers was below average. This might be due to the large number of pesticide companies promoting their products and persuading farmers to use them without being informed of the implications. Furthermore, the lack of effective natural/biological insecticides for RPW control is another factor contributing to the extensive use of pesticides [
41]. These findings are in line with the findings of Abd Rabou and Radwan [
51], who found that farmers in the Gaza Strip frequently used preventive and curative RPW insecticides.
An interrelationship between farmers’ adoption of RPW IPM and their knowledge of symptoms was observed. This means that farmers with a higher perception of visual symptoms of RPW exhibited higher adoption rates. In this regard, Donatelli et al. [
52] clarified that knowledge of pests’ signs and symptoms denotes awareness and perception of the damage resulting from infection. Correctly diagnosing symptoms is the first step in identifying possible solutions to a plant health problem and supports IPM decisions. Consequently, some management practices should be implemented by the government and farmers, including developing a protocol for visual inspection of RPW infestation; establishing a quick, reliable, cost-effective, and easily applicable early detection device or technique for RPW infestation; and conducting a risk assessment of the area using both visual observation and pheromone traps [
25]. This result is aligned with other studies [
20,
30,
53,
54] that have reported a positive relationship between knowledge of symptoms and IPM adoption for various pests.
5. Conclusions
To the best of our knowledge, this study is one of the first to examine farmers’ knowledge and IPM adoption behavior regarding RPW control. It was found that Saudi palm farmers require support to visually diagnose the symptoms of RPW. The level of farmers’ adoption of IPM categories (i.e., preventive, legislative, cultural, mechanical, and chemical) ranged between low and medium rates for all practices. Our results confirmed that RPW eradication requires collaboration between all stakeholders to control infestation sources, specifically in removing infested or dead trees and pruning products from neglected farms. However, an in-depth examination of the relationships between knowledge of RPW symptoms and IPM adoption demonstrates an interesting interplay between the two components. The evidence indicates that farmers with more experience in diagnosing RPW symptoms were more likely to adopt IPM. This research provides useful implications for policymakers. Developing an easy-to-use management platform—e.g., a mobile app tool that includes various RPW symptoms to bridge the knowledge gap identified in this study—is crucial. Furthermore, training farmers is also required. Training programs should aim to raise awareness among farmers about the significance of the RPW issue and the importance of removal and disposal of infested palms. These programs should also focus on developing farmers’ skills to use early detection devices or techniques for RPW infestation; implement good agronomic practices that limit RPW attack; develop a follow-up plan for preventive measures; conduct a risk assessment of the farm, adopting both visual observation and pheromone traps; and use preventive insecticide treatments based on trap capture data and infestation foci. To increase IPM adoption of RPW among farmers, facilitating knowledge-sharing on the consequences of IPM compliance is important. This can be achieved by organizing extension approaches such as farmer field schools. Future research analyzing the influence of social and economic aspects on IPM adoption at various infestation levels would be interesting. Such a focus could further clarify the factors influencing farmers’ IPM adoption for RPW control and eradication.