Tomato Farmers Knowledge of Integrated Pest Management Technique for White fly in Two Villages in Abo Homos Province of in Beheira Governorate

The present research aimed at analyzing the knowledge of whitefly  comprehensive control method among tomato growers in two villages of Abu Homus district at Behira governorate. Abu homus was selected as one of the major areas for tomato plantations, and the villages of Botoros and Jawad Hosney were chosen for they have concentrated tomato plantations that witness large outspreads of whitefly infestation. The data were collected through questionnaire during interview of a random sample of 124 growers according to Crigssy and Morgan equation. The statistical methods applied in the study were; mean, repeated charts, percentage, Pearson's correlation, and multiple regression.
The results show that: 82.26% of the respondents have low and medium knowledge of the tomato whitefly comprehensive control method and they suggest a significant positive relation between the respondents' knowledge degree of the tomato whitefly comprehensive control method and the following; total area planted with vegetables, total area planted with tomato, level of knowledge of the damages resulting from using pesticides in vegetables pests control and the level of participation in extension activities (p 0.01). There was a significant positive relation between the dependent variable and the number of education years (p0.05). The following variables had positive impact; number of years of education, total area planted with vegetables, total area planted with tomato, level of participation in extension activities (p0.01) based on the calculated t values (-3.167, 2.619, 2.424 and 5.224) respectively. Also these variables account for 58% of the changes in respondents' degree of knowledge of the tomato whitefly comprehensive control method based on R² value, that is, 0.576. Cucumber growers had several problems upon applying the tomato white fly comprehensive control method including; high process of control pesticides, lack of pesticides alternatives, not applying farming circulations systems for tomato, growing whitefly hosting plants next to tomato such as cucurbits, applying pesticides in not suitable times and lack of good application equipment, small number of extension fields applying tomato whitefly  comprehensive control method.