ABSTRACT
This chapter highlights the farming systems research (FSR) approach as an invaluable method to formulate appropriate insect pest management strategies tailored to equally complex Asian farming systems. In the FSR method, focus is on the farmer and his community. The FSR approach is holistic and the intensive site descriptive process encourages comparisons to be made between sites. In FSR, the spatial and temporal framework that binds conventional research to experiment station plots is removed. The experimental unit becomes the farm community where researchers can test area wide management. In small-scale rice agriculture, insect pest management is not an attractive technology for farmers if the message is only to use less insecticide, basing decisions on economic thresholds or other criteria. The integrated pest management recommendations should not be rigid to allow farmers a choice between levels of intervention. Nonadoption is a sign of a lack of inappropriate technology.
