The Ontario Agricultural College (OAC) and School of Environmental Sciences are pleased to announce the creation and appointment of a new research chair in sustainable pest management.

Prof. Cynthia Scott-Dupree has been appointed as the Bayer CropScience Chair in Sustainable Pest Management.

“This new role will keep the University at the forefront of sustainable agricultural practices in Canada and around the world,” shares Rob Gordon, dean of OAC. “Scott-Dupree is an industry leader who produces world-class research and trains highly qualified personnel specializing in insect health in the context of pest management in agriculture.”

“It has been a vision of mine to participate in sustainable pest management research that provides effective mitigation of insect pests of crops but also ensures that the environmental impact of these actions is minimal,” shares Scott-Dupree.

“Much of this funding is directed to training undergraduate and graduate students,” explains Scott-Dupree. “Training the agricultural scientists of the future is extremely important to me, and to Bayer CropScience.”

“The financial and collaborative support of Bayer for this investment helps facilitate work in the area of beneficial insect health and sustainable pest management in agriculture,” says Paul Thiel, Vice President, Innovation & Public Affairs at Bayer CropScience Inc. “Collaborating with the world-class research capacity at the University of Guelph is an important step to facilitate pollinator conservation and production agriculture.”

Scott-Dupree’s lab and field research focuses on determining the potential risks that flowering crops grown from neonicotinoid treated seed, such as canola, pose to bees She is currently developing standardized effective risk assessment methods for non-Apis bee species such as bumble bees and leaf cutter bees; developing pest management regimes for indigenous and alien invasive insect pests, devising methods for minimizing non-target pesticide effects, investigating the biology and ecology of beneficial insects to facilitate management/conservation strategies, and identifying toxicity profiles of novel control products on beneficial insects.

Scott Dupree has been a U of G faculty member since 1986. She has edited three books, and published over 80 refereed papers, almost 80 technical reports, and more than 30 extension publications.