4.3.5.3 Analysis of the economic production with and without the use of neem pesticides

For a comparison between cropping systems with synthetic insecticides and neem pesticides the following data are required:

· costs of insecticides for the specific control strategy
· yields as result of the specific control strategy
· total costs of the specific control strategy
· share of the insecticide costs for specific control strategy
· profit of the specific control strategy

A comprehensive study based on home-made aqueous neem kernel extract and subsidised half-finished neem products has been conducted by Leupolz (1995), who identified a range of constraints, and only a few crops where it was economical to apply aqueous neem kernel extracts.

To date there is no data available on economic evaluation and comparison of IPM systems with and without neem products or where medium and long-term effects of neem applications have been investigated.

To get an idea of the economic production with and without neem pesticides a rough approach might be to compare the costs of application on one hectare of neem and conventional pesticides competing with neem.

If formulated neem oil (4 l/ha = US$ 32.50/ha) is used as a substitute for conventional insecticides, the following price differences can be calculated (Table 50):

Table 50: Price comparison between neem oil and conventional pesticides

The survey reveals that the market potential for neem pesticides has to be seen primarily in the substitution of specialised expensive synthetic pesticides and expensive non-synthetic pesticides such as Pegasus, and less in the substitution of common cheap broad-spectrum insecticides.