In spite of widespread public concern for long-term
health and environmental e!ects of synthetic pesticides,
especially in Europe and North America, natural pesticides,
both of microbial and plant origin, have yet to have
much impact in the marketplace. Bioinsecticides, dominated
by Bacillus thuringiensis-based products, and botanical
insecticides, dominated by pyrethrum-based
products, each command little more than 1% of the
global insecticide market. However, recent government
action in the United States, in the form of the Food
Quality Protection Act of 1996, will dramatically restrict
the use of many conventional insecticides upon which
growers have depended for decades (e.g. organophosphates
and carbamates).