Sustainable Agricultural Pest Management for Mitigating Vector-Borne Disease Risks

Abstract

Agricultural pests and disease vectors threaten crop productivity, food security, ecosystem stability, and the health of farming communities. Conventional pest-control practices rely heavily on broad-spectrum pesticides, resulting in environmental contamination, non-target species decline, pesticide resistance, occupational exposure, and persistent vector habitats. This study develops an integrated sustainable pest management framework for simultaneously reducing agricultural losses and vector-borne disease risks. The proposed framework combines agricultural and environmental data acquisition, smart pest and vector surveillance, artificial intelligence-, Internet of Things-, and geographic information system-based risk prediction, sustainable intervention selection, One Health decision support, targeted implementation, and adaptive monitoring. Biological control, cultural practices, habitat management, biopesticides, precision application, and resistance management are prioritized over routine chemical spraying. The framework was evaluated through a model-based comparative scenario covering irrigated cereal, intensive vegetable, and mixed crop–livestock systems. Performance was assessed using pest suppression, vector reduction, disease-risk score, pesticide consumption, environmental impact, crop loss, yield, cost, and beneficial-organism retention. Compared with conventional management, the proposed framework increased average pest reduction from 63.6% to 84.3% and vector reduction from 55.7% to 80.0%. The normalized disease-risk score decreased from 0.72 initially to 0.27, while conventional management achieved 0.49. Pesticide consumption and chemical-application frequency declined by 56.3% and 56.9%, respectively.