FOOD WEBS IN SPACE: BIOLOGICAL CONTROL OF AGRICULTURAL PESTS NOW AND IN THE FUTURE

FOOD WEBS IN SPACE: BIOLOGICAL CONTROL OF AGRICULTURAL PESTS NOW AND IN THE FUTURE

Dr. Mattias Jonsson (Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences) | February 22, 2018 | 14h | Auditório Florestal, Instituto Superior de Agronomia, Lisboa, Portugal

Biological pest control is an important ecosystem service contributing to sustainable agricultural production. It is a service provided by a large diversity of natural enemies (predators, parasitoids, and pathogens), many of which are highly mobile. Thus to understand how biological control functions and to be able to provide well founded recommendations about how to conserve and enhance biological control, having both a food-web and landscape perspective is important. Using examples from my own research, I will in this presentation discuss: 1) how natural enemy biodiversity and food-web structure contributes to biological control of agricultural pests, and 2) how local and landscape management can be used to conserve biological control today and in the future.

Mattias Jonsson obtained his PhD at Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) in 2002, and at first he worked with conservation biology of forest organisms (especially insects). During a postdoctoral period at Lincoln University, New Zealand 2005-2009, his research changed focus from conservation of biodiversity in forests to conservation of biological control in agriculture, and since then this has remained his primary research area. Mattias currently works as a senior researcher and lecturer at Department of Ecology, SLU, and holds a half-time assignment at Centre for Biological Control at the same university.