1 Introduction

India is a growing global power with consistent high economic and technological growth. However, the share of agriculture in the gross domestic product is declining. Reduced input-use efficiency of the factors of production, soil organic carbon and fertility, water table, nutrition and livelihood security, food safety coupled with vagaries of climate change and increased pests and pandemics and human-animal conflict due to overlapping food niche characterise Indian agriculture at present (ICAR, 2020). Agriculture offers livelihood to about 58% of India’s 1.38 billion population. The production of food grain and horticultural crops are 296 and 320 million metric tonnes (MMT), respectively, from 142 million hectares leading to apparent self-sufficiency. Furthermore, ~US$ 29 billion was the share of exports during 2020. India has the largest livestock population of 536 million with milk production of 198 MT (IBEF, 2020). Poultry at 852 million (DAHD, 2020) together with livestock and fisheries contributes to protein nutrition. Fisheries and allied sectors provide livelihood to more than 14.5 million and the marine resources of India comprise an exclusive economic zone of two million sq. km, a continental shelf area of 30,000 km2 and a coastline of 8,118 km with annual marine fish landings of 3.50 MMT (CMFRI, 2020). Agriculture and allied sectors remain the fulcrum in determining the country’s social and economic status in terms of food, nutritional and environmental security. Demand projections for food grains is 345 MMT by 2030 and high-value commodities of horticulture, dairy, livestock and fish are increasing faster than food grains by more than 100%. One of the serious impediments in enhancing productivity with sustainability to achieve the millennium goals is the pandemics, which cut at the edifice of production and productivity across sectors of agriculture, horticulture, livestock and fisheries in addition to threatening biodiversity, food safety and ecosystem services.

Pests are both native and transboundary in nature affecting human health, agriculture-cum-allied sectors. World witnessed many transboundary pest outbreaks, some regional and others pandemic in nature. Their outbreak or epidemics or pandemics lead to famine as in locust plague and mass migration as in late blight of potato leading to economic, environmental and social chaos. This is true when zoonotic impact human health on a global scale. In India, being a predominantly tropical/subtropical country and with little elasticity between demand and production, even a small upheaval can lead to strong social and political turmoil as seen with diseases impacting onions, tomato and potato crops. Often, the impact of pests and pandemics on the natural biodiversity and ecosystem services is direct. The indirect costs associated with ecological imbalance, food safety, migration and health go unnoticed and unaccounted. Increased travel and international trading of agricultural commodities amidst fluctuating environmental factors and changing sociocultural milieu has continuously contributed to new and emerging pests in India in the last 50 years including the recent pandemics of corona virus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Global trade, travel and climate change impact all systems of the one earth but the intentional and unnoticeable effects of various factors of pest dynamics require a wholesome biosecurity that allows careful capture of significant temporal and spatial trends of biodiversity and ecosystem services with the objective of mitigating potential threats before they assume pandemic proportion. Thus, in an era of aspirations for achieving food and nutritional security with food and environmental safety amidst climate change, it is imperative to address the status of pests, pandemics and the preparedness to tackle them from a scientific biosecurity framework. The current chapter examines the key problems of pests and possible pandemics among various components (human/plants/animals/birds/fish) in the Indian context while examining the possible steps to be undertaken in the coming decade towards mitigation keeping the Sustainable Development Goals in focus.

2 Pests and Pandemics: Crops

Potential productivity of agricultural and horticultural crops is challenged by insect pests, diseases, weeds, nematodes and some vertebrates. Their impacts on farmers, consumers and all organisms down the food web are significant and often devastating. During each cultivation cycle of agricultural and horticultural crops, production and productivity losses of ~15.7% occur in India owing to pests (Dhaliwal et al., 2015) accounting to ~US$ 36 billion. Of the 173 invasive alien species documented, 54, 25 and 22 represent terrestrial plant species, pathogens and insects, respectively, till 2018 (Sandilyan, 2016).

2.1 Transboundary Plant Pests

Transboundary pests are a serious threat to food security and environment, a condition exacerbated in recent decades by the globalised movement of people and commodities. India witnessed an upsurge of desert locust in 2020 with their swarms attaining epidemic proportions during COVID-19 pandemic. Rajasthan was on high alert with swarms entering Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana Gujarat and Telangana between May and June. As in the first week of July 2020, FAO had sounded a high alert with the possibility of more swarms of locusts likely to migrate from Somalia to along India-Pakistan border (FAO, 2020a, b). Cassava mealybug (CMB) is the latest invasive insect in 2020 first observed in Thrissur, Kerala (Joshi et al., 2020) and has spread to Tamil Nadu causing 9–46% infestation. Prevention of spread to unaffected areas and action for eradication (ICAR-NBAIR, 2020) and importation of CMB-specific parasitoid, Anagyrus lopezi is currently underway. The fall armyworm (FAW) invaded maize in India during May 2018, and spread across all maize growing states. Recently it was also reported from Bangladesh. India recommended eight insecticides however, with conservation and augmentative biocontrol-cum cultural control interventions given prime importance (AFFRC, 2019). Rugose spiralling whitefly (RSW), first noticed on coconut from Tamil Nadu and Kerala in 2016, later spread to Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Goa and Assam, through infested seedlings and transportation of plant materials (CPCRI, 2019). Banana, mango, sapota, guava, cashew, maize, ramphal (local fruit in India), oil palm, Indian almond, water apple, jack fruit and many ornamental plants are host crops of RSW (NBAIR, 2020). Natural buildup of the parasitoid, Encarsia in RSW endemic areas and enhancing its niche survival are given focus at present. South American Tomato Moth (SATM), an invasive insect on tomato both under greenhouse and field conditions, was reported in 2014 (Sridhar et al., 2014) with its spread to several states, has established as a regular pest. While natural incidence of Metarhizium anisopliae on larval SATM was up to 35%, resistance breeding through screening of wild and cultivated tomato genotypes is underway as a long-term management strategy. Papaya mealybug (PMB) caused significant damage to agricultural and horticultural crops since its documentation in 2007 at Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu. Mulberry crop over 1500 ha in Tamil Nadu too got destroyed (Shekhar et al., 2011). However, classical biological control using Acerophagus papayae from Puerto Rico is a success story that reduced incidence of PMB from 49 to 3%. Cotton mealybug (CMB) first recorded in Gujarat in 2005 caused yield loss of 30–40% in Punjab amounting to INR 1590 million during 2007 (Dhawan et al., 2007) and 40–50% in Gujarat. Infestation of CMB was reported from 71, 141, 124 and 194 species of plants belonging to 27, 45, 43 and 50 families, respectively, across cotton growing zones in India (Vennila et al., 2011) and the parasitoid, Aenasius bambawalei offered fortuitous biological control (Gautam et al., 2009). Invasive eucalyptus gall wasp (EGW) of 2001 (Anonymous, 2007), spread across south (Jacob et al., 2007), central (Kumar et al., 2007) and northern states threatening the productivity of paper and pulp industry in 2007, however, is being kept under check presently by the native parasitoids (Ramanagouda et al., 2011). Other established invasive plant pests in India include silver leaf whitefly (Ananthakrishnan, 2009), coconut eriophyid mite (Sathiamma et al., 1998), spiralling whitefly (Mani, 2010) and coffee berry borer (Singh & Ballal, 1991) that are managed on need basis. Occurrence of Fusarium wilt (race 1) infecting Cavendish in 2010 (Thangavelu et al., 2011) and tropical race 4 (TR4) reported from Uttar Pradesh in 2017 was also recorded from Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Maharashtra. Productivity of banana, especially Cavendish varieties is highly reduced by TR4 in several parts of the country (FAO, 2019) and the poor man’s source of nutrition was at stake. Infected areas in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh saw a remarkable control of TR4 on account of microbial consortium developed by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR). Citrus greening disease is destructive in major citrus belts of Maharashtra, Punjab, Southern and North-East India with its transmission through grafts and psyllid vector (Das, 2008) necessitating supply of disease-free citrus seedlings to reduce its incidence and damage.

3 Emerging Pest Problems: Insects and Diseases

Pest problems from the categories of insects, diseases, nematodes and weeds of economically important crops of agriculture and horticulture including protected cultivation emerge or change due to alteration in climate and crop production practices. Outbreaks of plant hoppers (Anonymous, 2018; Chander & Patel, 2010, Prakash et al., 2014) and swarming caterpillar (Anonymous, 2009; Tanwar et al., 2010) on rice are noticed every now and then owing to congenial weather exacerbated by excessive nitrogenous fertilisers, closer spacing and indiscriminate insecticide use. Neck blast in Karnataka during periods of unseasonal rainfall (Chethana et al., 2016) and bakanae (Bashyal et al., 2014; Gupta et al., 2015) occurrence across basmati growing tracts are the diseases of rice creating havoc. Increasing incidence of aphids in wheat, barley and oats (Sharma & Saharan, 2011) and yellow/stripe rust of wheat in severe form at certain pockets of north Indian states (Sharma, 2014) make the emerging scenario. At a time when per capita consumption of protein is declining with increasing number of mouths to feed, the production of pulse crops is threatened by biotic risks such as gram pod borer, spotted pod borer, pod sucking bugs and pod fly in addition to the major fungal and wilt diseases. A recent phenomenon is the delayed withdrawal of Southwest monsoon and excess precipitation leading to many fungal diseases across crops including pulses in Karnataka and Maharashtra. Outbreaks of defoliators on soybean in Maharashtra in 2008 (Lokare et al., 2014), stem rot on groundnut in the north of West Bengal (Baskey et al., 2020) and sunflower necrosis (Sardaru et al., 2013) add to perennial shortage of edible oils in India, wherein, the imports exceed domestic production. Increased incidence of bollworms/borers, resistance to Bt in pink bollworm and sap feeding insects such as whitefly in Punjab in 2015 take a toll on production and productivity of cotton. Changing scenarios of insects during and post Bt era are a continuum with current plant protection revolving around pink bollworm and sap feeders (ICAR-NCIPM, 2019). White grubs (Anonymous, 2017) and disease pokkah boeng (Viswanathan, 2020) gained importance in recent years.

Sucking insects (hoppers, mites, thrips and whitefly) pose significant problems to horticultural production. Many species besides being direct pests, are effective vectors of plant pathogens such as viruses and phytoplasma. While fruit fly complex is a major problem in many horticultural crops, leaf weevil devastating mango and litchi in Punjab (Sharma et al., 2015), mango shoot gall psylla at Uttarakhand (Kadam et al., 2017), sapota seed borer in Maharashtra (Patel, 2001) and litchi stink bug outbreak in Jharkhand (Jaipal et al., 2013) are hindrances to fruit cultivation. Bacterial blight of pomegranate epidemic in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra (Mondal & Sharma, 2009) and mango sudden decline (MSD) in Andhra Pradesh and anthracnose on fruits cause widespread damage. Incidence of chilli gall midge (Nagaraju, 2000) and Solenopsis mealy bug attacking vegetables of Malvaceae, Solanaceae, Leguminosae and Cucurbitaceae are the emerging problems. Whitefly as a sucking pest and vector cause extensive economic damage in chilli, tomato and okra (Halder et al., 2013). Hadda beetle on cowpea and bitter gourd (Singh et al., 2014), plume moth in bottle gourd (Rai et al., 2014) and diamondback moth in crucifers (Ahmed et al., 2009) also cause serious menace.

Potato late blight, an annual threat of North India (Chowdappa et al., 2011), has been causing epidemics in southern states of India on tomato and potato since 2008 (Chowdappa et al., 2013) possibly due to A2 clonal lineage introduced from Europe (Chowdappa et al., 2015). Giant African snail is detrimental to colocasia, elephant foot yam, cucumber, cowpea, field bean, pea, ladies’ finger and tomato with its sporadic outbreaks among crops of bitter gourd, beans, bottle gourd, chilli, tomato and cauliflower (Puri & Mote, 2004). Diseases caused by tospoviruses (Prabhakar et al., 2017) vectored by thrips have emerged as a limiting factor for the sustainable production of tomato and watermelon. Aphid transmitted papaya ring spot virus is of major significance that can impact availability of vitamin A to the common man. Stemphylium blight and iris yellow spot virus associated with onions and anthracnose on many horticultural crops, are emerging as serious threats. Occurrence of insects and diseases inside polyhouses exceed open field cultivation because of favourable moisture and humidity (Singh et al., 2017) and absence of environmental resistance. The uninterrupted cultivation under greenhouses contributed towards high incidences of soil-borne diseases (Sharma, 2012) and especially root knot nematodes. Severity of powdery mildew, bacterial wilt and root rots was found more alarming with dominance of tospo and leaf curl viral diseases in protected cultivation (Somasekhar et al., 2012).

3.1 Emerging Pest Problems: Nematodes and Weeds

Nematode problem is gaining momentum across all cropping systems of Indian agriculture. Plant-parasitic nematodes cause 21.3% crop losses across 19 horticultural and 11 field crops (Kumar et al., 2020). Root knot, reniform, lesion, foliar, burrowing and bulb-cum-stem nematodes are the most destructive and difficult to control pests that certifications have become essential nowadays for protected cultivation in glass and polyhouses. Both ecto- and endo-parasitic nematodes inflicting serious damage are a cause of concern in forests. A potential risk of introduction of pine wilt nematode in the Himalayan region of Indian territory exists through the import of coniferous wood and their products especially from China through Nepal, Bhutan and Myanmar (Khan, 2020). Declining organic matter and pH directed micro-irrigation and fertigation have accentuated the problem both in the open and protected conditions. Weeds also cause reduction in yields of various crops and are more harmful than insects and diseases with potential crop yield losses ranging between 15 and 76% (Gharde et al., 2018). Herbicide resistance in weeds, changing climate, direct-seeded rice and zero cultivation led weed species, plant parasitic Orobanche in mustard and alien weeds viz., Parthenium, Lantana, Ageratum, Chromolaena and Mikania (Rao, 2018) have become aggressive despite wider use of chemical and bio herbicides for weed control (Kaur et al., 2014).

3.2 Pests and Pandemics: Livestock

Vast agro climatic, geographical regions and cultural differences have led to differential husbandry practices as well as diseases occurrence in livestock. In recent years, emerging and re-emerging diseases of livestock, poultry and piggery have tremendously increased along with growing demand for and supply of meat, milk, eggs and fish. Fresh and processed products are witnessing increased trade and likelihood of carriers of contaminants. Breach of biosecurity in intensified livestock production and management systems is often the reason for spread of zoonotic and other animal diseases with considerable impact on public health. The societal conundrum that exists in the country prohibits the drastic measure of slaughtering and disposal of the infested and in-contact animals and hence the rate and speed of disease spread are faster even if identified on time; besides wet markets, across the country, are very conducive for zoonotic diseases. Foot and mouth disease (FMD) is a continuing epidemic decreasing the productivity of cattle, meat, wool, etc., due to unrestricted movement of animals across Indian states and incomplete vaccination. In FMD control areas, there is built-up of herd immunity and substantial fall (Subramaniam et al., 2013). Outbreak of Peste-des-petits ruminants (PPR) affecting goats and sheep in Tripura is a transboundary disease (Begum et al., 2016) and about 99% nucleotide identities existed with Bangladeshi viral strains (Muthuchelvan et al., 2014). Several PPR outbreaks were encountered in India with high morbidity (50–90%) and mortality (50–85%; Muthuchelvan et al., 2015). Bluetongue transmitted by Culicoides spp. was severe in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu (Hemadri & Hiremath, 2011) and impacted the farmers in the recent past.

Lumpy skin disease (Anonymous, 2020a), a capripox infectious viral disease, transmitted by mosquitoes and flies is fast spreading among cattle and bovines in districts of Maharashtra and Assam. Sheep poxvirus and goat poxvirus cause economic losses to small ruminant husbandry with mortality of young animals exceeding 50% in almost all states (Bhanuprakash et al., 2011). Bovine herpesvirus-1, higher in crossbred and exotic breeds, causes economic losses through reduction in milk yield and impact on national and international trade of germplasm and livestock. Bovine viral diarrhoea in cattle (Sood et al., 2007), sheep and goats (Mishra et al., 2009) and buffaloes (Mishra et al., 2008) are also important. Picobirnaviruses are emerging threat to mammalian and avian species associated with enteric and respiratory infections. Bacterial diseases viz., haemorrhagic septicemia, black quarter, anthrax, brucellosis, leptospirosis, listeriosis, tuberculosis, bovine tuberculosis and para tuberculosis are infectious on livestock with some of them having zoonotic significance. Anthrax is one of the top five zoonotic diseases in India. Listeriosis is also fatal to ruminants (sheep, goat, cattle, buffalo and camel), non-ruminants (horse, pig, canine, rodent, wild animals and birds) and humans (Dhama et al., 2013, 2015).

Bovine tuberculosis is a chronic bacterial zoonotic disease, which easily spreads to humans through inhalation of aerosols or ingestion of unpasteurised infected milk (Prasad et al., 2005). Parasitic diseases viz., fascioliasis in sheep, trypanosomiasis in wild animals, dogs, horses, camels, donkeys, cattle and buffaloes, bovine tropical theileriosis in indigenous cattle and crossbreeds and babesiosis in bovines are regular pests of ruminants (Saminathan et al., 2016). Recent incidence of tick-borne disease causing Congo-haemorrhagic fever associated with sheep has made inroads into Rajasthan and is an emerging zoonotic disease (Tripathi et al., 2020). The slaughterhouse wastes thrown outside become agents for further spread of vector-borne diseases of animals closely associated with wet market. Although rinderpest of cattle in the past has been eradicated, the same cannot be said of FMD and anthrax diseases.

In pigs, incidence of brucellosis, swine erysipelas, greasy pig disease, Streptococcus suis infection and methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus infections are common and widespread. Injudicious use of antimicrobials in pig rearing has resulted in emergence of multiple drug-resistant bacteria with significant public health implications. Antimicrobial resistant bacteria are transmitted to humans through direct contact and through the environment, pork and pork products (Rajkhowa et al., 2018). Viral diseases among pigs are classical swine fever, rotavirus infection, FMD and porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome. India reported first case of African swine fever and its outbreaks in Assam and Arunachal Pradesh both in domestic pigs and wild boar during 2020. Porcine circovirus-2 infection is an emerging disease and its tracking of the epidemiological pattern in northeast hilly regions of India (28% of pig population) gives an alarm for alertness (Rajesh et al., 2020). Diseases of poultry that have produced historical panzootic along with zoonosis are avian influenza and Newcastle (Ranikhet) disease. Furthermore, viral diseases viz., fowl pox and avian leukosis, the bacterial diseases like tuberculosis, fowl cholera and Escherichia coli infections cause outbreaks in poultry farms. Other fatal infections are due to tick fever, infectious coryza, protozoans causing coccidiosis, internal (round and tape worms) and external (lice, ticks, mites and fleas) parasites are debilitating pestilence to birds and workers (Singh, 2020). Avian malaria can be threatening to the poultry and needs to be kept under vigil. Farm families are often exposed to the bovine encephalitis, swine flu and many other diseases of piggery in addition to virus influenza of poultry. Avian influenza had hit 12 Indian states alongside of COVID-19 pandemic during 2021 and the chicken consumption got reduced by 20%.

3.3 Pests and Pandemics: Fisheries

Primary constraint to sustainable aquaculture is the occurrence of diseases affecting product trade and socioeconomic status of fishers. Growth of shrimp aquaculture in India during last two decades has significantly increased the diseases (Pantoja et al., 2008). The loss due to disease outbreaks in shrimp farms located in nine coastal districts was estimated to be INR 10,000 million (Binesh & Jithendran, 2013). Disease occurrence is variable in ponds, open-water and cage culture. Mostly, the protozoan ciliates, monogenetic trematodes and crustacean ecto parasites are reported. The Ichthyophthirius, causes white spot or ich in freshwater fishes. Bacterial diseases of septicemia, edwardsiellosis, flexibacteriosis, bacterial gill disease, mycobacteriosis and columnaris are often reported in semi-intensive or intensive pond culture systems (Das, 1999; Fegan et al., 1991). Saprolegniasis and epizootic ulcerative syndrome are important fungal diseases in fish culture (Durai et al., 2015). Many viral infections viz., white tail/white muscle, monodon baculovirus, yellow head disease, white spot disease, Taura syndrome virus, infectious hypodermal and hematopoietic necrosis virus, hepatopancreatic parvovirus, infectious myonecrosis virus, acute hepatopancreatic necrosis/early mortality syndrome and hepatopancreatic microsporidiosis are of concern to Indian aquaculture (Mishra et al., 2017). Cyprinid herpesvirus-2, koi ranavirus, carp oedema virus, megalocytivirus and goldfish hematopoietic necrosis herpes virus are the diseases of ornamental fish culture (Glazebrook et al., 1990). Outbreaks of Tilapia lake virus was reported in West Bengal and Kerala (Behera et al., 2018). Intensive shrimp farming with imported Penaeus vannamei (Rajendran et al., 2016) brought in microsporidians, which is causing huge loss to Indian shrimp industry.

3.4 Pests and Pandemics—Effects on Food, Nutrition, Employment and Environment

In India, with its higher population density and poverty, the requirement of food and nutrition is of paramount importance for development of children and adults including women. Number of persons in the age group of 50 and above would increase significantly in coming years with each one requiring different but calibrated amounts regarding energy and protein. Indian farming is becoming more complex due to competing factors of growing population, land competition, climate change, food, feed and nutritional expectations, labour availability, mechanisation, producer and consumer dilemmas, price policies, scarce capital, environmental consciousness in addition to societal pressure on basic health and safety expectations. All these factors would offset the balance of country’s economy vis-à-vis nutritional or energy requirements to be achieved in a sustainable way. Any reduction in supply of pulses and edible oils would adversely impact the nutritional food intake of population, especially economically weaker section of the society. Horticultural crops serve as the best alternatives to food crops economically and ecologically in providing nutritional security. Both fruits and vegetables are primary sources of minerals and proteins in addition to other compounds such as antioxidants. The requirement of vitamin A, C, B1, B12 and many others are absolutely met by the Indian mass to a larger extent through horticultural crops, which are highly susceptible to pests. Although, horticultural production seems to have increased whether it would keep pace with the increasing demands of rising population and the middle-class segment is a matter of concern. Social changes associated with rural youth shifting to urban areas for education and work vis-à-vis changing pattern of food preference have transformed the balance between demand and supply of type and quantity of food items not to mention of the variety of processed and semi-processed products in use.

Demand-driven growth in livestock production in rural and semi urban areas will enable millions of poor to escape the poverty trap besides contributing towards women empowerment. Share of poultry and other meat that serve as source of protein, vitamins and minerals is expected to grow from 12 to 24% by 2030 on account of rapidly changing consumer behaviour. The poultry industry in India is constantly advancing due to the use of modern technology and switching from live bird to fresh chilled and frozen poultry product market. Poultry sector is to produce designer eggs. These are organic eggs rich in omega 3 fatty acids and with lower levels of saturated fats and cholesterol. Poultry industry with its growth rate of 12–15% is providing a low cost source of dietary protein to the consumers as well as employment opportunities. Weak hygiene and inadequate biosecurity in rural settings of poultry are often compensated arbitrarily by intensive use of antibiotics. Unsafe disposal of poultry litter leads to multi-drug resistance properties in bacteria. Antimicrobial resistance is thus the greatest threat in our fight against infectious diseases. Antibiotics such as tetracycline, doxycycline and ciprofloxacin, critical to human health, are used for growth promotion in poultry. A more concerning issue is the use of colistin for growth promotion, prophylaxis and therapeutic purposes in poultry that move in food chain. Rampant use of benzathine penicillin for animal use is obvious through six manufacturers as against just one for human use. Misuse of antibiotics and presence of Salmonella and cholesterol in poultry meat are the cases of unsafe food of human consumption. With increasing consumption of seafood globally, aquaculture has grown dramatically over the years and as per an estimated report the infectious microbial diseases of fish cause loss of around US$ 6 billion each year. Changing forest expose the domestic livestock to a new range of pathogens and vectors that previously existed only in wildlife niches. While pandemics are once a while, everyday living circumstances of humans happen in an environment which is highly infectious prone. Closer or overlapping contact between wildlife, animals and humans and organised livestock and poultry farming in close association with people cause spread of infectious diseases with potential to threaten health, economies and food security while compromising biosecurity. Increased trade of raw commodities and processed foods carry the pathogens that act as food poisons affecting health of humans in addition to introducing new organism into countries and continents (Yadav et al., 2020). Whether it is food or nutritional security or human health they are all fundamentally interconnected and lack of nutritional food and its safety make the population susceptible to several diseases. Many of the pests and pandemics not only impact farmers directly at farm level but also through disruption of supply chain and position of agriculture at national level impacting food and nutrition of a wider population. Workers engaged in cattle, pig or poultry farming when impacted by zoonotic diseases migrate to their home districts or states that result in reduction of labour availability to farmers as it happened with the pandemic of COVID-19. Mass movement or displacement of labour has not only left the employment in agricultural and non-agricultural sectors vacant but the movement itself served as a cause for secondary spread of pandemic.

3.5 Pests and Pandemics—Effects on Biodiversity

Most of the problems in agriculture from soil health, pestilence, zoonotic, pandemics and food safety can be traced to adverse impact of intensive, mono-cropping, seriously threatening natural as well as agro biodiversity in soil, forests and aquatic systems. Pest infestation at a pandemic level reflects an invasive or loss of biodiversity. Population growth to 1.6 billion by 2050 seeks higher provisioning for energy and commodities aggravated by changing dietary habits and climate change. Demographic pressure would compel modification of natural landscapes and intensification of agriculture and allied sectors leading to biodiversity loss per se. Biodiversity loss leads to increased pests and pandemics and vice versa. Epicentres shall sprout as humans, livestock and wildlife share large pools of microorganisms in proximity. Further, manifestations of new species or adaptation of existing species to new hosts would result in changing structure and rate of emerging infectious diseases. Loss of species can increase encounter rates between pathogens and hosts when the lost species are not hosts for the pathogen. Expansion of agricultural areas through deforestation can lead to increased wildlife-human and livestock-wildlife contact with livestock-human transmission leading to a range of infectious disease outbreaks and emergency events and modification of transmission mechanism. Besides agricultural encroachment, road construction, logging, dam building, irrigation, wetland modification, mining, the concentration or expansion of urban environments, coastal zone degradation and modification of natural landscapes cause a cascade of factors that exacerbate infectious disease emergence. Use of drugs such as antibiotics, vaccines and agrochemicals destroy the biodiversity and openly impact the ecosystem services with the expected management practices of pests during pandemics. Indiscriminate policies and practices over the last 60–70 years with scant respect for environment and biodiversity have caused India maximum harm. The nation must resolve to leave the current forests and natural landscapes to safeguard biodiversity and to avoid frequent and virulent pest outbreaks. One of the factors leading to emergence of epicentres of zoonotic is the wet meat market especially when wild animals are slaughtered as in the case of COVID-19. Serious thinking on this is needed to prevent future zoonotic and epidemics so as not to repeat the events of Spanish flu of 1920 and COVID-19.

3.6 Pests, Pandemics and Biosecurity

Most of the zoonotic viruses have significant possibilities in bioterrorism and have potential to wipe out humans and animals although neither any evidence exists as on date nor any sane person on earth would attempt to exploit microbes that are less evolved than mankind. Advances in molecular biology such as gene editing can make profound changes in genetic manipulations of organisms, and implications of such technologies in occurrence of pandemic and its mitigation need serious thinking. Institution of appropriate and timely biosecurity measures is an important instrument for protection and improvement of animal health. Breach in biosecurity due to ignorance and lapses in adoption of timely biosecurity measures in management of livestock, poultry and fish are salient reasons for the high incidence of emerging and transboundary infectious diseases. India’s stance, like most of the nations across the globe, to the ongoing COVID-19 biosecurity crisis is largely responsive and reactive than being proactive from a biosecurity perspective, exposing low level preparedness towards pandemics (Athavale, 2020). In India, biosecurity has remained next to biosafety even after four decades of legislation. The proposed Agricultural Biosecurity Bill and the National Biotechnology Regulatory Authority aim to establish an integrated national biosecurity system covering plant, animal and marine issues. Under the Integrated disease surveillance programme, a network of public laboratories with biosafety practices and infrastructure was established although up-gradations are needed to be continuous considering technological advancements. In India, about 30 bio-safety level (BSL) laboratories of the level of BSL-III or BSL-II+ are currently under operation with only two BSL-IV facilities. Prevention of transmission of pathogens across intra- and inter-country borders warrants devising biosecurity measures at par with international standards. International guidelines are developed by WHO, FAO and OIE (OIE, 2020) in respect of human, plant and animal pests and pandemics. For handling the most dangerous transboundary pests more of BSL-III and BSL-IV laboratories in the country are required to ensure biosafety, biosecurity and biocontainment. Biosecurity needs to be observed from farm to national to regional and international levels in a bottom-up approach. Farm level biosecurity practices are available for crops, cattle, sheep, pig, poultry and fish production systems with best designs in terms of phyto/zoo sanitary measures such as quarantine, rodent and vector control, disinfection of animal sheds and premises, proper disposal of dung, urine, feed and fodder wastes and proper carcass disposal for effective management of infectious diseases although ground level adherence is still wanting. India needs to take a look into its biosecurity preparedness and plug all the big gaps to prevent being blindsided to dangerous biological agents either man-made or natural. A number of biosecurity preparedness measures applicable for zoonotic and human diseases, have implications for plant quarantine, which is lagging behind leading to a cascade of invasive pests affecting field and horticultural crops.

4 Impact of Climate Change on Pests and Pandemics

Climate change through global warming, depletion of ozone layer, rise in sea level or increase in vector-borne and communicable diseases, has the potential to affect agricultural production and hence pressure on livestock industry. Effects of climate change on animal production include climatic influences on quantity and quality of feed and fodder resources such as pastures, forages, grain and crop residues and the severity and distribution of livestock diseases and parasites. Global warming could increase water, shelter and energy requirements of livestock for meeting projected milk demands. Increasing sea and river water temperature is likely to affect fish breeding, migration and harvests. Population dynamics of insect/vectors and epidemiology of diseases are highly influenced by temperature and relative humidity. It is predicted that climate change-induced aberrations favour invasive pests and diseases at the cost of natural regulation. Heavy damages due to the pod borer in pigeon pea and chickpea from early warming (3–5 °C) in North India and outbreaks of gram and spotted pod borers in South India due to unseasonal (extended) rains during October–November were observed (NCIPM, 2017). Trend of sucking insects (leafhoppers and thrips) and peanut bud necrosis incidence on groundnut was greater at hot semi-arid over arid zones with associated climatic variability quantified (Vennila et al., 2018, 2019). It has come to the fore that despite insect transmitted, or vector-borne viral diseases cannot be controlled through pesticides, they will increase under the climate change scenarios. One of the pests that explodes with higher temperature is the red spider mite that infests a wide range of crops both in the open and under protected conditions. It is not an understatement that most of the new insecticides are acaricides. The increased incidence of pathogens be it bacteria, spirochetes, viruses, phytoplasma etc., can drastically impact productivity, nutritional quality besides the availability of seeds and quality planting materials. Although demographic pressures will continue to increase on crop production in the coming decade, the solution lies in understanding ecological dimensions of pandemics both at micro level as in case of soil health, nematode infestation and soil-borne pathogens influenced by reduced soil organic matter and pH etc., and macro level climate change induced by global warming, excess and intensive precipitation. Weather based early warning system serves as climate resilient tool for desert locust (aided by FAO) and diseases of potato and grape in India. Simple protocols for field level implementation on assessment of pests and pandemics using technology driven proxy indicators are being piloted under Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana initiative of Government of India integrating multiple stakeholders on a single platform (PMFBY, 2020).

A probable 10–40% loss in crop production, likely aggravation of heat stress in dairy animals reducing milk production to the tune of 1.6 million tonnes and increasing sea and river water temperature impacting fish breeding, migration and harvest are projected (Prabhakar, 2018). Shift in distribution of vector-borne disease of livestock such as blue tongue that has 27 serotypes across the globe is anticipated (Shyam et al., 2014). The poultry segment faces a number of interrelated stress from climate change such as higher temperatures affecting growth rates, egg production and health and disease management. Poultry farming in Karnataka by 2030 with an increasing temperature (0.8–3.3 °C) is likely to result in increasing incidences of heat stress-related morbidity and antibiotic use, the latter causing immune system compromise leaving broiler chickens more susceptible to bacterial infections (Jennifer & Jayant, 2019). Perception of coastal fishermen of Kerala indicated that the prime impact of climate change would be a sea level rise and consequent changes in habitat, frequency of extreme events, variability in the catch and revenue of fishery followed by economic and environmental aspects with social parameter scoring the least (Vass et al., 2009). On the positive side, limited social and industrial economic activities during COVID-19 pandemic resulted in improved air quality by 30–60% (Mahato et al., 2020) although it could only be temporary. India has a strong and unique programme of National Innovations in Climate Resilient Agriculture (NICRA) across all sectors of agriculture viz., crops, horticulture, livestock, fisheries, natural resource management and extension for research and development on one platform for addressing the impact of climate change. Development and implementation of multi-location, multi sector mitigative and adaptive cum resilient strategies to combat challenges posed by climate change to Indian agriculture is the mission (Prabhakar, 2018).

5 Pests and Pandemics: Preparedness and Policy Needs

Pandemics change the very edifice our living, business, commerce, health, travel, education, research and politics exposing the vulnerability of humankind and environment despite advancements of information technology, molecular biology, data management and communication involving multilateral global organisations such as World Health Organization (WHO, 2020), Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO, 2020c) and Office International des Epizooties (World Organization for Animal Health) (OIE, 2020). At times, the exotic pests get unreported either due to non-detection or fear of losing trade. Despite new technologies of animal and plant health management, the % loss to their productivity remains the same and hence the solutions have to be highly tangible. Twenty-first century is determined by the sustainability and environmental protection targets. Since, the direct and indirect losses due to pests and pandemics are economically and socially immeasurable and all countries are equally vulnerable, there is an urgent need for trans-national collaboration and co-operation through a global initiative to monitor, sensitise, train and manage.

Plant-quarantine legislation in India aims to secure protection from the ingress of exotic pests during import and export under the aegis of Department of plant protection and quarantine and storage (DPPQ&S), the National plant protection organisation for the International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC) of United Nations. As the sole international standards setting body for plant health, the IPPC works closely with FAO, national and regional plant health authorities, academia and private sector representatives to lower the risks of fall armyworm under the framework of ‘FAO global action on FAW control’ (FAO, 2020d) in which India is also partnering. While strengthening of sea and air ports are needed to strictly examine the planting materials brought into the country by passengers from abroad and extensive networking with neighbouring countries is a must for monitoring invasive pests. A better preparative approach towards managing invasive pests would be through such established networks operating across countries that could facilitate quick and ease of import of natural enemy or other resources upon pest invasion, if possible obviating the need for formalities of request for import that cause inordinate delays. The investment of time and resources by DPPQ&S in implementation of IPM dilutes the mandate of quarantine and ignores the reinforcement of diagnostic laboratories and pest risk analysis. Department of Biotechnology under the Ministry of Science and Technology takes care of biosafety issues in dealing with genetically modified organisms, and issues on biological warfare are dealt by the Ministry of Home Affairs. The Centre for Animal Disease Research and Diagnosis of Indian Veterinary Research Institute, Izatnagar, with its five regional disease diagnostic laboratories and state diagnostic laboratories, is involved in quarantine, eradication and vaccination/management of and animal, fish, respectively, following standards of the OIE that are further promoted by WHO and FAO. Chaudhary Charan Singh National Institute of Animal Health, Baghpat, is the nodal institute to do quality control and licensing of veterinary biologicals in India. Several animal health schemes have been initiated in the states and at the Centre, such as the national project on rinderpest eradication, contagious bovine pleuropneumonia eradication, FMD control and additional schemes and programmes are implemented by the Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying under the Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying of Government of India (Anonymous, 2020b). National Accreditation Board for Certification Bodies for the testing and calibration of laboratories is the sole accreditation body in India that provides third party assessment of the technical competence of testing including medical and calibration laboratories, proficiency testing providers and reference material producers (NABL, 2020).

Under Indian set up, lack of timely convergence of agencies has often resulted in delayed declaration of pest invasiveness making detection surveys poor with slow or no eradication measures. Similarly, critical areas such as upgradation of diagnostic laboratories, quarantine facilities, strengthening of risk analysis mechanism, research prioritisation, development of database and adherence to standard operation procedures of WHO/FAO/OIE need effective implementation. There is need for a stronger national biosecurity policy with coordination, collaboration and convergence among organisations, institutions, department and ministries for work on invasive and emerging pests with focus on developing pest risk-analysis models and early-warning system. Addressing issues from an environment, biosecurity and ecosystem services perspective and in a bottom-up approach starting from village to the region to nation to globe would contribute to automatic reduction of the numerous problems associated with human, plant and veterinary health. Human resources with expertise and well defined roles need to be deployed with networking to a national platform having centralised reporting on transboundary and emerging pests. Regional microbial repository with bioinformatics on infectious diseases with their geographic and temporal distributions, barcoded/molecular characterised diagnostic protocols, strains/serotypes/lineages/variant groups, vaccine escape/drug resistant mutants and epidemiology along with services of pest risk mapping require greater attention. Pest diagnostics happen through visual, microscopic, fluoroscopic and radiographic methods, electronic nose (e- nose) systems (Cui et al., 2018), DNA barcoding and high-throughput molecular methods. Environmental DNA (eDNA) technology coupled with isothermal nucleic acid amplification tests (iNAATs) including loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) (Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry & Fisheries of Japan, 2019), biosensors, hyperspectral techniques and artificial intelligence are gaining importance in recent times.

Approach to effective management of pests and pandemics depends on the type of pest and a single solution does not fit for all, although there are common elements. While the quarantine or invasive pests require an effective and successful timely reporting for their containment or eradication, for pests with rapid spread (e.g. locusts, avian flu etc.,) a centralised approach is needed in terms of database, resource use and training. In this information age, effective pest monitoring is the key, and the collected data should have an open access for further scientific research using innovative tools such as artificial intelligence in combination with human intelligence to derive response information for pest management and target user. Forging alliance with a well-founded global supportive surveillance with good database policies embedded with human resource development would be an investment for the present and immediate future of India.

Management of pests and pandemics at farm level although has gone through many transitional and scientific approaches, holistic health management through tactical integrations and adoption of good agricultural practices must be supported by sound legal framework. Genetic improvement through molecular assisted selection and introgressive breeding for increased yields, tolerance/resistance against pests in crop-animal-avian and fish (Anonymous, 2020c) systems and desired fortification of nutrients (proteins/vitamins/minerals etc.) are continuing pillars of food and livelihood security. Genetic improvement of crop plants, livestock, poultry and fisheries through exploitation of wild, exotic and national germplasm stocks to evolve using science led breeding to result in pest resistant, climate resilient, nutrient fortified and high yielding progenies suitable for diverse agro ecologies, offer high scope to fundamentally tackle pestilence. Utilisation of biotechnological approaches to evolve genetically modified crops/animals resistant to pests and herbicides complemented by robust biosafety trials ably supported by policies and investments for infrastructure development are the need of the hour. Indian Council of Agricultural Research dedicated 17 bio fortified cultivars of eight crops to the nation containing one or more of nutritive elements (e.g. Zn, Fe, Ca), amino acids (lysine, tryptophan) and protein during 2020. Power of science and politics should be synergised to harness the socio-economic-cultural values of or for and by the nation for empowering people with prosperity of health, wealth and dignity vis-à-vis a cleaner and valuable environment.

Implementation of electronic (e)-pest surveillance and digital dissemination of advisories (Vennila et al., 2016) across different states for crop/animal and fish sectors have led to adoption of scientific pest management by the farming community. The ongoing programmes viz., crop pest surveillance and advisory project (CROPSAP, Maharashtra), horticulture pest surveillance and advisory project (HortSAP, Maharashtra) and e-pest surveillance in vegetables (Haryana) are a few successful examples for digital surveillance and delivery of the pest management advisories to farmers with absence of pest outbreaks. Many mobile apps as information and expert systems along crops and theme areas of plant protection are currently available (Vennila, 2016). Information network system for animal productivity and health, a desktop/android-based field application facilitates capturing of real-time data on breeding, nutrition and health at farmer’s doorstep. Features of easy replicability, extensive area coverage, efficient use of resources and extreme robustness of e- based pest surveillance fulfil the policy adoption of integrated pest management and ‘Digital India’ together. Surveys and surveillance at all levels of production systems would aid in immediate reporting of an invasive pest or outbreak and simultaneously offer alertness to everyone concerned. Surveys and surveillance require dedicated deployment of tools including the standard methodologies and personnel, and it has always been an endeavour of public sector. However, manufacturers/dealers of agri-inputs (seeds/fertilisers/farm machinery/agrochemicals/veterinary biologicals) should contribute to centralised platform of national surveillance with traceability associated with input distribution. Increased investment in infrastructure development with participation of the private sector having backward and forward integration would be a better policy perspective.

In plant health management, India has a total of 292 pesticides registered and per hectare consumption of pesticides in India is on rise (600 g/ha) after 2009–10 (DPPQ, 2020). Injudicious use of pesticides has led to problems of resistance (Dhaliwal & Koul, 2010; Fand et al., 2019; Sethi & Dilawari, 2008; Thind et al., 2009), resurgence and residues. Not all crops have registered plant protection chemicals and farmers often use off label products that have implications on food safety and export. Hence grouping of crops and commodities (554 numbers) in line with the codex classification and guidelines for label expansion and recognition with respect to maximum residue limits was a step forward by the government. Pesticide market, which is projected to reach INR 292.9 billion by 2023 is fraught with non-genuine products in markets (Croplife, 2015). Recent draft notification on ban of 27 pesticides comprising eight fungicides, 12 insecticides and seven herbicides across 134 formulations for 74 crops is subject to scrutiny. Therefore, the Pesticide Management Bill, 2020 must emphasise on adopting systematic standard operating procedures with transparency with optimisation of benefits between the industries and growers mediated by the government. Mass production technologies ready for agribusiness in biocontrol (ICAR-NBAIR, 2019) are in place for predators and parasitoids against insect pests and microbial pathogens of crops including those for the recently invaded FAW in maize. Upscaling the production of parasitoids, predators and bio pesticides in an entrepreneurial approach or at cottage level for large scale field use is necessary. Enabling policies for quicker registration and quality control are necessary for enhancing of the preparedness for the deliberate use of biological products in agroecosystems.

Sustainability is the most important factor that is not taken too seriously, and desired changes need to be implemented in livestock farming. India became free of the cattle plague, caused by rinderpest virus infection of livestock that existed since early 1950, following efforts over half a century through launching and relaunching of ‘National Project on Rinderpest Eradication’. Mass vaccinations and revaccinations of goat tissue virus vaccines (GTV-Edwards and Plowrite and Ferris strains) helped the country to be rinderpest free since November 2004 as endorsed by OIE in 2005. However, collaboration with many other countries continues as one of the preparedness with emphasis on surveillance and to develop as many vaccines as possible and storage (Yadav et al., 2020). Although science-led development of finding vaccines for viral diseases happens, their affordability and availability to cover the entire population are lacking. It is largely the organised livestock and poultry farms that get the vaccines administered while nomadic/stray cattle as left outs continue to harbour diseases. High use of antibiotics in livestock and poultry production is most often attributed to low compliance with regulation and poor antimicrobial stewardship (Laxminarayan & Chaudhury, 2016), as the costs associated with antimicrobial resistance in human health are an externality to the farming industry. The global cost of inaction on containing antimicrobial resistance by 2050 has been estimated to be the lives of 10 million humans every year, reduction of livestock production by 7.5% and of the declined gross domestic product by 3.5%. Hence the requirements are: (i) well established system of systematic surveillance, (ii) coordination among vaccine producers, (iii) maintenance of minimum quality standards capacity building in terms of infrastructure, diagnostics and technologies, (iv) quality control of veterinary biologicals, (v) centralisation of veterinary drug regulation authority, cold chain maintenance during vaccine transportation, (vi) judicious vaccination especially in poultry and canines and (ix) awareness creation on farm level good livestock production practices.

Since growth of culture fisheries has increased the vulnerability to aquatic diseases to transboundary nature is high. Hence, in the globalised environment, issues of sharing water basins, transboundary movement of migratory fish species and aquatic animals, trade and India’s alignment to international standards need attention. Regionally, coordinated and cooperative management of shared fishery resources between the centre and states is required for long-term sustainability. Aquaculture sustainability depends on improvement of germplasm and their screening, promotion of usage of specific pathogen-free seed stocks, disease management, farming through international collaboration/cooperation traceability, standards, testing and certification of aquaculture produce along with requisite regulatory framework and infrastructure. Aquaculture zonation and spatial planning consisting of identification of appropriate location, zones and common practice options help in management of diseases, environmental issues, post-harvest and marketing, mitigation of risks, etc. At present, crop-livestock integrated systems are recommended for areas having irrigation facilities or receiving about 1000 mm rainfall where production of surplus crop residues and allocation of some land for fodder cultivation and use of feed supplements are possible. Farming Murrah buffaloes, crossbred cows and mixed farming consisting of crop with an inclusion of 10–20 synthetic backyard poultry breeds boosted income of farmers. Crop-livestock-poultry-fishery integrated farming systems are mostly suitable for high rainfall areas, where paddy is cultivated both in monsoon and after. Cows and buffaloes are maintained in the backyard with crop residues and supplements. Fish is reared in farm ponds and poultry is maintained in cages over the pond with grain and bran supplementation. The droppings of poultry serve as feed for the fish in the pond. Policy for sustainable farming and animal rearing through incentivising farmers to adopt safe and healthy rearing practices of healthy feed/diets for livestock/poultry/fish, medication free rearing, safe disposal and safe processing is essential. Industry at large should be sensitised how higher use of antibiotics hampers health in turn negatively affects sales of both poultry and fishery products and sustainability. It is a sad story if these antibiotics enter honey in the food web. Enhancing the fodder supply, integrated production systems, value addition, information and knowledge sharing through farm advisories, crop-cum-livestock insurance, conservation and promotion of selective, trait-specific native breeds exploiting improved animal breeding, contingent fodder-animal planning, mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions, scaling-up of proven resilient production systems to spread the adaptation options and innovations to a wider community with capacity building of smallholders would certainly build resilience of rainfed production systems in India.

6 Prospects of ‘One Health’ Approach

Indian agriculture is best personified by the small and marginal farming of crops, cattle (cows, buffaloes, sheep and goat), poultry, fisheries and a complex of many other activities simultaneously taking place. Pest and pandemics would continue to occur and could be with more frequency and intensity and hence proactive approaches are needed. COVID-19 experience demonstrated in addition to loss of millions of human lives the destructive power and ripple effect of a pandemic invisible virus across the spectrum of health, education, travel, politics, livelihood and economics. In a globalised interconnected world with large-scale movement of men and material across the length and breadth of one world, no country or region is excluded from transboundary pests or pandemic diseases. Hence, a revised strong regional and international cooperation, taking hard lessons from COVID-19 pandemic is an urgent need. Changing climate, rapid transport, travel, zoonotic influenced by overlap of man-animal and organised animal husbandry including poultry act as precursor for onset of diseases. As per estimates 8,50,000 viruses are circulating in wild life out of which 20,000 are corona viruses.

The changing land use and deforestation lead to spill over of infections from wildlife into livestock which in turn causes epidemic in humans with the potential of pandemic lurking mankind. Preparedness to tackle zoonotic infections of the future under conditions of climate change and environmental degradation require a concrete approach in unison exploiting the concept of ‘One Health’ as it recognises interconnectedness of human-animal-plant- environment. One Health is a globally accepted model for research on diagnosis, epidemiology and control of existing and emerging zoonotic threats through collaborative efforts of multiple disciplines working at local, national, regional and global levels to achieve optimal health for all as defined by its task force. Coordination, collaboration, co-operation, communication and commitment are advocated within as well as between sectors. While each sector should enhance its own capacity in terms of infrastructure, diagnostics and technological up-gradations, real time collaboration with other sectors is needed so that experiences and collective wisdom can be pooled and used to improve the health of all components. During 2017, India released the ‘National Action Plan on Antimicrobial Resistance’ and it needs to be vigorously adopted (Ranjalkar & Chandy, 2019). India through Kerala Veterinary and Animal Sciences University (Anonymous, 2020d) launched ‘One Health’ research centre for developing a sustainable disease control system using health analytics and data management tools to address the emerging zoonotic threats and prevent emergence of new communicable diseases. Approach of ‘One Health’ towards preparedness is a forward-looking continuum and requires a long-term commitment for research to thwart the emergence of new communicable diseases. Medical, veterinary, paramedical sectors and bioscience (agriculture and life science) researchers need to scale up the approach across the country for building public health capacity with meaningful international collaborations.

7 Way Forward

The experience of COVID-19 taught humanity at large its vulnerability to life and living, direct and indirect impacts on nation’s biosecurity and socio economy. Despite all the interlinked challenges of security and safety of food, environment, health and biodiversity, India’s focus is towards sustainably increasing agricultural productivity, farm incomes, food security and sectoral development by building resilience at multiple levels. The diversified Indian agroecosystems and sectors are replete with history of pests and pandemics. Research-cum-developmental organisational set up and industries dealing with health system of human, livestock, poultry and fish have all the paraphernalia needed for an effective preparedness and management of pests and pandemics. But their operational success is fraught with shortcomings of lack of coordination and collaborations. Individual excellence should translate to collective management. Slighter adjustments and reorientation in functioning of stakeholders interlinked through a common hub under the ‘One Health’ concept would uplift the standards of diagnostics, preparedness and pest management.

Pre-import and post-entry quarantine require need based international cooperation and collaboration and India needs strengthening of plant quarantine with focused efforts on biosecurity along the lines of livestock disease surveys and diagnostic system. In India, DPPQ&S should focus on quarantine and leave implementation of integrated pest management to state bodies to successfully manage invasive and transboundary pests. The ‘Biosecurity Bill’ introduced in 2013 needs to be operative for better protection of crops/livestock/poultry/fisheries of the country and the region from pests. Reprisal for new and emerging pests need inter departmental coordination, and it is important to have descriptions of pests whether new or emerging or re-emerging with understanding of pest-pest, host-pest and host-pest-environment. National diagnostic laboratories equipped with tools and trained human resources, exclusive electronic pest surveillance systems using standard protocols, and field workers functioning together by convergence of public and private organisations/institutions/departments/industries should be mandatory. Surveillance must be aided compulsorily by geo reference based mobile apps developed using protocols adhering to international phytosanitary standards for invasive pests and national sampling procedures for management emerging pests. An e-reporting system involving artificial intelligence for diagnosis and data analytics integrated at server level with edaphic and weather factors represented in a geo platform would help in geo spatial early warning and subsequent pest management preparedness. Updated scientific information system linked to real time pest scenario derived from e-surveillance would facilitate digital pest management advisories automated for dissemination to end users. Forging a self-reliant integrated ‘One Health’ management system require partnership of public and private stakeholders for needful production and supply of demand driven human/veterinary vaccines and quality pest protection products for plant/animal/poultry/fish.

Vertical integration of agricultural education is the key to improve the quality of human resources in the country and many more post graduate students must be encouraged to address zoonosis, with focus on epidemiology, ecology, biodiversity, molecular characterisation with expertise in big data analytics. Set of educational curriculum with skills of surveillance in all sectors with adequate training needs special focus to ambush pests and pandemics. Empowering agri-graduates and diploma holders to take up contractual system of plant-animal-poultry-fish protection in identified areas such as field pest/epidemic monitoring, bio agent mass production, manufacture of sensor-based gadgets, coordination of input supply and delivery system of agrichemicals/vaccines at farm level would be prudent to generate employment and to serve as pathway for securing a better health for all. Developing an entrepreneurial capacity for mass production of macrobial (parasitoids and predators), microbial (growth promoters, antagonists, entomopathogens) and plant-based products in addition to mechanical traps at cottage level would aid in sustaining natural farming systems.

Registration of biological control agents that is quick, scientific and with quality assurance will provide impetus to commercialise the technologies. Policy framework facilitating execution of proactive strategies of plant protection by governmental departments with hand holding of growers and input industries is essential. No other time is better than the present for use of digital tools and mass media to execute a unified ‘One Health’ system. Enhancing production and income of farmers through reduction of yield losses caused by pests should be the motto of plant pest management towards fostering national food and environmental security. Human public health services are given priority over veterinary and plant health in India including the poor insurance schemes for agriculture and allied sectors. However, human and environmental health could be simultaneously improved by the same policy or management actions provided agriculture and animal husbandry expansion and intensification, and other modifications of natural landscapes are implemented in a way that minimises biodiversity losses. Media should play an important role in educating the do’s and don’ts during pandemics and hence, media management must go hand in hand with strong scientific research outputs and information reaching the public in a simplified way.

Political environment of India with its neighbours and the rest of the world shall contribute towards sustainable development through mitigation of pests and pandemics. ‘We are healthy if our neighbour is healthy’ should be the slogan. India has a framework of ‘environment’ governed under Ministry of Environment and Forest with the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare that functions for agriculture, animal husbandry and related sectors. Since the environment is beyond forest and wildlife, there needs to be a separate Ministry of Environment that could address issues such as climate change, depletion of corals, loss of biodiversity, water, air and ecosystem services holistically and the wider scale of land agriculture, forests, seas, oceans and mountains put together. Environment is global and cannot be confined to forests. Indian agriculture and forestry are two sides of the same coin, and both must be accounted together to tackle problems of shrinking forests, agriculture and allied sectors. Consistency in infrastructure development with political and financial commitment provided on a crop and region neutral basis would transform the ways and means of managing pandemics in the country.

India should align closely with the global community on aspects of carbon emission or footprints and global warming pertaining to climate change both at regional and global level. The melting of ice especially in Himalayan regions and associated soil erosion down the plains need a preparedness. Accurate monitoring of natural disasters of cyclones, drought hailstorms and floods and their forecasts strengthen the preparedness at local and macro level. Health management approach at local level for different sectors must be based on each of agroecological region of different agroclimatic zones of the country with revisits made once in five years for suitable calibrated changes. Sustainable production system begins with natural resource management. Soil health and its enrichment come with enhancement of soil carbon and biodiversity through vegetation and other means. Rivers and water reservoirs are lifeline of entire population and the water consumed and utilised for various purposes need safety guards for which stringent policy decision for each river basin must be promulgated. Considering that agriculture and allied sectors are State subjects in India, investment into improvement of organisational set up such as setting up of plant/animal/fish health clinics equipped with infrastructure for training and advisory and linking the supply chain of agrochemical/antimicrobial/vaccine marketing through such clinics are needed. Nevertheless, a governmental or contractual system of field pest management using standard operating procedures is a plausible strategy. Innovative institutional models, pro-agricultural policies and regulatory mechanisms would accelerate innovations, ensure food security, enhance livelihood opportunities of smallholders and conserve natural resources.

8 Conclusion

In a globalised world, the safety and sustainability of the developed world depends on solutions provided to the less developed countries and global bodies have an immense responsibility. Monitoring of wet markets dealing with wild animals in places such as Congo, Wuhan and other places is the key to mitigate a potential threat. Every new pest reported elsewhere should be in the radar of international scientists who should in turn forewarn potential pest threats based on simulation and prediction models. Therefore, science-led global cooperation and collaboration is a must to mitigate the impact pests and pandemics. Precise and quick diagnostics using molecular taxonomy, in general, and immunisations with quality vaccines against viral pandemics in particular deserve more research and development (R&D). Exploitation of biotechnological tools for whole genome sequencing and for development of resistant genetic stocks of crops/animals and fish, understanding the epidemiology and environmental interactions of pests and pandemics through advanced analytics, and innovations in food processing techniques of therapeutics with inbuilt biosecurity-cum-biosafety associated with trade are the priority areas of R&D to bring about positive transformations in food and health systems. Since R&D is best served with human resource development, India needs investment into development of human resources by international experts in the advanced fields of molecular taxonomy, epidemiological modelling, big data analytics and impact assessment of success and failure in our preparedness to fight pests and pandemics. Like delayed justice, delayed mitigation of pandemic is a denied mitigation and there cannot be any policy paralysis in management of pandemic irrespective of region, religion, country, race or political system. Formulation of legislation should account for multi-sectoral stakeholders in a bottom-up approach, keeping the goal of profitability and sustainability of farming and welfare of the common man as targets. Global collaboration and cooperation, science-led policy decisions, meta-analysis and data management supported by effective and transparent communication across nations in sharing information with human resource development shall contribute to better preparedness leading to better mitigation and management of future pests and pandemics. Working together with optimisation of production and productivity of crops, animals, poultry and fisheries would result in sustainability with profitability. The time has come to appreciate biodiversity and ecosystem services better and to respond many of our problems including pests and pandemics.