Managing Bacterial Spot of Tomato: Do Chemical Controls Pay Off?

Bacterial spot of tomato (BST) is a disease that severely afflicts crops, especially in geographic areas such as the Southeastern U.S., where environmental conditions favor rapid development. Farmers usually use chemical treatments copper–mancozeb mixtures and acibenzolar-S-methyl, among other methods, to manage BST. However, these generally fail improve marketable yields, thus raising question whether BST are economical. We evaluated efficacy profitability bactericide consisting copper-mancozeb, streptomycin, well three inoculation levels Xanthomonas euvesicatoria pv. perforans, on management Florida. Across separate field trials, severity was inversely correlated with yields; however, provided no statistical improvement yields. By accounting for yield treatment costs, our analysis showed did not pay off economically; net returns were statistically equivalent untreated controls.