Special Issue "Alternatives to Chemical Approaches for the Management of Insect Pests in Post Harvest"

Dear Colleagues, 

Some of the insect species that begin infestation in the field (e.g., during the ripening stage of crops) are often able to continue the attack in the following phases of the supply chain, where they can find optimal environmental conditions to develop. Indeed, several species can infest the foodstuff even during its packed life, that is, during distribution, transportation, and storage in warehouses or in retail stores.

Considering that heavy insecticide and fumigant pressure is often maintained in order to protect foodstuffs, insects have shown a strong ability to increase their resistance to the most-used chemicals. Moreover, the growing public concern over the potential health hazards of synthetic pesticides, together with the alarming increase in prices of commodities such as cereals, has determined the urgent need to minimize the use of chemical pesticides, making available environmentally sound and socially acceptable alternative control strategies for the management of these insect pests.

Among the alternatives, biological control and physical methods are now among the most interesting tools that can be included in a wide (integrated) pest management program.

This Special Issue aims to summarize and report the recent advances in IPM technologies that can play a decisive role in pest management within post-harvest systems.

Dr. Pompeo Suma
Dr. Sara Savoldelli
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Insects is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2000 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• insect pests
• foodstuff
• alternative control strategies
• IPM