Experience gained from efforts to contain an olive decline in southern Italy and research needs to manage it in the Mediterranean region

Abstract EN

Xylella fastidiosa (Xf), a xylem-limited and vector-transmitted bacterium, has subspecies (fastidiosa, multiplex, pauca) which are known to induce several diseases in woody and herbaceous plants (more than 360), mainly in the American continent.

In 2013 the subsp.

pauca strain CoDiRO, vectored by Philaenus spumarius, was found in Apulia region (Italy), causing the quick decline of a million olive trees with severe economic, environmental and social consequences.

The Italian government and the EU Commission soon declared a state of emergency strengthening phytosanitary measures.

In the demarcated area, which includes the infected and buffer zones, intensive monitoring, eradication and containment measures, vector control, movement restrictions of plants, and planting prohibition of host plants are carried out.

More than 200,000 plants were tested to assess the presence and spread of the infection, which currently affects approximately 16 per cent of the national olive growing area.

Sampled and infected plants were mapped, management of monitoring data was fully computerized, and several initiatives were carried out for awareness campaigns and capacity development (www.emergenzaxylella.it).

In this contest, an innovative model for the surveillance of Xf was developed and provided to the Plant Protection Service to support institutional decision making.

This model is multidisciplinary, multifunctional and includes multiple actors.

It allows the traceability, storage, management, and analysis of different types of data using a web-based software (XylWeb).

The tool combines remote sensing data, obtained through the photointerpretation of high-resolution aerial images for rapid identification of suspected symptomatic trees, with field data acquired accurately with the application XylApp.

The model includes on site methods for early detection of the pathogen (real time LAMP and DTBIA) in plant material and ‘spy insects’.

This model is under improvement through current research initiatives.