41st Annual Meeting of the Society for Invertebrate Pathology
and 9th International Conference on Bacillus thuringiensis

Entomopathogenic fungi are part of the functional biodiversity in agricultural ecosystems and have a valuable contribution to make to sustainable pest management strategies through the ecosystem services they provide. Conservation biological control (CBC), involves ‘modification of the environment or existing practices to protect and enhance natural enemies --- to reduce the effect of pests’. CBC does not rely on the addition of natural enemies but rather on identifying strategies to promote those natural enemies already present within crop ecosystems, based on a thorough understanding of their biology, ecology and behaviour. CBC approaches are applicable to entomopathogenic fungi and in this paper I will provide a background on how entomopathogenic fungi are currently exploited in CBC and then discuss the theory, practice and opportunities available for their further development and utilisation in ecologically-based pest management strategies.