Two N.C. State professors helped create an education program that helps warn soybean growers about the threat of a deadly crop disease known as Asian Soybean Rust.
Jim Dunphy, a crop science professor, and Steve Koenning, a plant pathologist and research associate professor, are well known for their work with the Soybean disease.
Asian Soybean Rust is a plant disease that can cause significant losses in Soybean crop yields in many regions of the world. South American farmers first observed the disease in 2001, just before it began to spread throughout the continent.
The International Integrated Pest Management Symposium awarded Koenning and Dunphy for their extension and education program in 2012.
Koenning and Dunphy have published information to help growers understand and detect Soybean Rust because it is a new disease to the soybeans of the United States.
Researchers at various universities located in states including Georgia and South Ca rolina notify Koenning and Dunphy immediately upon detecting Asian Soybean Rust in their crops.
Koenning and Dunphy traveled numerous times to Brazil and other South American countries to research Soybean Rust and learn how to track its movement.
Scientists in South America taught Koenning a lot about the disease, which is relatively new to the United States, according to him.
“There has been a lot of interaction with scientists in South America, and to some extent, they educate us more than we educate them about Asian Soybean Rust,” Koenning said.
Researchers feared the worst when the disease first hit the United States in 2005, because multiple tropical storms produced the optimal climate for the disease, which tends to thrive in warm, wet environments.
Researchers expected growers to lose between 10 and 50 percent of their soybean crops. Some researchers feared farmers could lose as much as 80 percent of their crop if climate conditions reached those most conducive for the spread of the disease. Luckily for soybean farmers, the weather did not produce optimal conditions for Soybean Rust to spread to the predicted level, but the threat was real.
Soybean Rust generally affects crops in Southeast states rather than Northern states because the cooler weather limits the disease’s ability to flourish.
North Carolina is the largest producer of soybeans on the east coast, and in 2012, farmers grew about $790 million worth of the crop. Soybean Rust has been a problem for North Carolina and has prompted farmers to help finance research because there are more acres of Soybeans than any other crop, according to Dunphy.
“We have a lot of famers that have a lot of acres involved,” Dunphy said. “To lose yield to a disease is like taking a cut to their paycheck, and they don’t want to do that. I wouldn’t want to do that, but that’s what happens to a farmer if he loses a yield to disease like that.”
Growers in North Carolina can use Dunphy and Koenning’s tracking information to find out when Asian Soybean Rust outbreaks may occur and how to protect their yields.
The impact of Koenning and Dunphy’s research has been local rather than global, Koenning said. The two professors collaborate with other researchers located at other institutions, such as Clemson University, and they help educate and warn Soybean growers in Southeast states like Georgia, South Carolina and Virginia about the disease.
