SYSTEMATIC REVIEW article
Front. Remote Sens.
Sec. Agro-Environmental Remote Sensing
Volume 6 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/frsen.2025.1571149
A Systematic Review of Remote Sensing Technologies and Techniques for Agricultural Insect Pest Monitoring: Lessons for Locustana Pardalina (Brown locust) Control in South Africa
Provisionally accepted
- 1Department of Geography, Environmental Management & Energy Studies, Faculty of Science, University of Johannesburg, Johannesburg, South Africa
- 2Department of Geography, Environmental Management and Energy Studies, University of Johannesburg, Johannesburg, South Africa
- 3Geoinformation Science Division, Agricultural Research Council, Natural Resources and Engineering, Pretoria, South Africa, Pretoria, South Africa
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Insect pests are responsible for 20% to 40% annual agricultural production losses globally, leading to an over-reliance on pesticides in farming practices (Ribeiro et al., 2023). This has resulted in the overuse of pesticides which adversely affect the environment, human health, and natural resources. Integrated Pest Management has been utilized to enhance insect pest control, decrease the excessive use of pesticides, and enhance the output and quality of crops. However, remote sensing provides alternative and cost-effective tools to enhance insect pests monitoring and targeted management. This study provides a systematic review of remote sensing technologies for insect pest monitoring. The study analyzed 103 studies published between 2014 and 2024 indexed from Scopus and Web of Science (WOS) databases. The results showed that insect pest monitoring studies using remote sensing increased each year in the past decade. Furthermore, findings revealed that MODIS and Landsat are mainly used sensors to detect and monitor insect pests on vegetation. Most studies reported that insect pests have been detected in forests and croplands, with newer sensors such as Sentinel-2 and PlanetScope holding potential for systematic assessments in the future. United States of America (USA) and China are in the central position with insect pest monitoring research contributions. However, the analysis highlighted lack of research contributions in Southern America and African countries, which encourage research efforts and greater involvement of international participation. Recent advances in remote sensing emphasizes the need for more research incorporating new sensors and predictive modelling in monitoring and assessment of insect pest such as the notorious Brown Locust in South Africa.
Keywords: Food security, Climate Change, MODIS, Sentinel-2, Landsat, Sustainable development goals
Received: 05 Feb 2025; Accepted: 07 May 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Mpisane, Kganyago, Munghemezulu, Price and Nduku. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Kuselwa Mpisane, Department of Geography, Environmental Management & Energy Studies, Faculty of Science, University of Johannesburg, Johannesburg, 2006, South Africa
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.