Pest management science often disregards farming system complexities

Abstract Since the 1940s, pesticide-intensive crop protection has sustained food security but also caused pervasive impacts on biodiversity, environmental integrity and human health. Here, we employ a systematic literature review to structurally analyze pest management science in 65 developing countries. Within corpus of 3,407 publications, find that taxonomic coverage is skewed towards subset 48 herbivores. Simplified contexts are commonplace: 48% studies performed within laboratory confines. 80% treat tactics an isolated rather than integrated fashion. 83% consider no more two out 15 farming system variables. Limited attention devoted pest-pathogen or pest-pollinator interplay, trophic interactions across ecosystem compartments natural regulation. By overlooking social strata, sizable scientific progress agroecological translates into slow farm-level uptake. We argue enterprise should integrate complexity chart sustainable trajectories for global agriculture achieve transformative change ground.