Training the Next Generation

Background

A highly trained and engaged workforce is critical to enhance innovative and practical pest management with local-to-global solutions that address current and future challenges. One major challenge is training competent professionals in regulatory pest management to lower the number of invasive pests that devastate crops globally. This is the mission of USDA–APHIS, NPPO (National Plant Protection Organization) and NAPPO, who ensure that the U.S. and their trading partners comply with WTO (World Trade Organization) and IPPC (International Plant Protection Convention) rules and standards. Also, APHIS used to teach a course RA 101—Fundamentals of Risk Analysis for Plant Protection to train staff required to serve U.S. and international NPPOs as well as partners in other organizations and countries. The course has been discontinued. There is a market to re-imagine this course and deliver it to a world-wide audience.

CIPM hires many interns, graduates and professionals who subsequently achieve successful careers in regulatory pest management. CIPM has also recently become more engaged with extension IPM programming, particularly agent training, within North Carolina, and has organized educational exhibitions at public events.

Future Plans

The Center has four major future plans. i) CIPM proposes to establish a working agreement with current and recent APHIS staff to transfer RA 101 materials to CIPM staff. CIPM will compare these with the training materials available at the IPPC website. CIPM staff will partner with APHIS and NAPPO staff to ensure the relevance, applicability and quality of the CIPM pest risk analysis (PRA) course. The feasibility of face-to-face on-site courses will be assessed. CIPM will explore the feasibility of coordinating with APHIS International Service (IS) to arrange the training in developing countries. A process for certification of PRA mastery will be developed. CIPM could become a training center for developing countries and industries to learn the updated international phytosanitary measures. Such a training center could be recognized first by USDA–APHIS, then by NAPPO and even by IPPC. CIPM has the advantages of multilingual and university-affiliated professional staff. CIPM can apply for funds to support training courses. ii) CIPM has provided leadership for the USDA–NIFA EIPM coordination grant. We plan to work with North Carolina Cooperative Extension and hope to hire an Extension Associate who will take a primary lead role in designing IPM train-the-trainer programs across the state in multiple commodities. iii) CIPM will hire interns, graduates and professionals, train them to achieve their career aspirations, and enable them to secure jobs in regulatory plant sciences and other IPM-affiliated careers. iv) CIPM proposes to be more engaged in teaching citizens and K–12 students about pest management and IPM.