Averting a Fruit Fly Emergency in Mexico with a Nuclear Technique

A swift and effective emergency response, building on years of IAEA assistance, is helping the Mexican state of Colima to avoid significant economic damage from an outbreak of the Mediterranean fruit fly, also called medfly. Responding to a request for support from the Mexican government, the IAEA, in cooperation with the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO), has over the last 13 months assisted national plant protection authorities in Colima in bringing the outbreak towards an end. Assistance has included developing and providing guidance for the execution of an emergency action plan using a nuclear technique which serves as a birth control for pests.

"In the past the Mediterranean fruit fly has been a big threat to the horticultural industry in Mexico and we have developed large scale programmes to defeat and contain its spread along our southern border," said Maritza Juarez Durán, Director of the National Fruit Fly Programme of the Mexican National Service of Health, Food Safety and Quality (Senasica).

"The detection of this pest in Colima in April last year, 1,300 kilometers from the closest wild populations located in the state of Chiapas, at the border area between Mexico and Guatemala, was alarming and we value the IAEA's and FAO's support in helping us bring it under control."

The implementation of the emergency action plan, supported through the IAEA´s technical cooperation programme, employs the sterile insect technique (SIT) as the main tool to eradicate the outbreak. This insect population eradication approach relies on the release of sterilized male flies. Irradiation with gamma rays was used to sterilize mass-reared medflies so that, while they remain sexually competitive, they cannot produce offspring, decreasing the population over time. The SIT is among the most environment-friendly insect pest control methods available and the IAEA supports countries, including Mexico, in reducing and eliminating medfly populations.