Technological and Economic Study of Integrated Pest Management of Olive in Tartus and Latakia Governorates.

The purpose of this study is to determine agricultural extension agents, andfarmers knowledge level of Integrated Pest Management (IPM) techniques and identify personal variables that could affect their knowledge levels and adoption of Integrated Pest Management (IPM) techniques of olive orchards in Syrian coast, Syria. And to recognize the problems that impede olive growers in using Integrated Pest Management techniques, and to suggest an extension program for enhancing olive farmers' knowledge on using the IPM.This research was carried out in Tartus and Latakia Governorates in 2017/2018, data were collected through face-to-face interviews with a random sample of 420 olive growers and 69 agricultural extension agents by using two questionnaires designed for the purpose of this studyData on frequencies, percentages, averages, standard deviations, relative im-portance index, five-point Likert scale, correlation coefficients, and multiple linear regression, in addition to SWOT matrix were used for data analysis.Results showed that: almost 80% of farmers had a low and medium levels of knowledge about IPM. Moreover, almost 56%, 32% of farmers had medium levels of IPM adoption in Tartus and Latakia, respectively. And there was significantly positively correlated with degree of participation in extension activities and knowledge, but negatively correlated with land fragmentation and constraints of IPM using. As that, 43% of variance explained by the studied independent variables.About 58% of agricultural extension agents had a low and medium levels of knowledge about IPM, 47% had IPM training, and 45% had medium levels of in-formation exposure degrees, In addition, significant relationships were found be-tween knowledge levels and gender, education, the number of training courses, degree of information exposure, whereas insignificant relationships were found between knowledge levels and each of their age, and the experience in agricultural extension.The most important constraints of IPM using were: IPM treatments are expensive, and there is no difference between the clean products and products containing chemical residues in local markets. Moreover, SWOT analysis showed that, there200were many opportunities to improve olive agriculture in Syria by following appro-priate strategies.The study eventually came to a suggest an action plan with a view of enhancing the knowledge level in using and adoption of IPM techniques.As a recommendation, the concept of the IPM should be promoted among the farmers and the role of agricultural extensions in farmers awareness and transfer of knowledge should be reinforced through scientific and practical plans.