No cure for crop viruses after 14 years — and no data on the damage

As climate change raises fears of wider crop virus outbreaks, South Korea has not a single registered pesticide approved for plant virus control. Twenty-five new plant viruses have been identified in the country over the past five years, yet the government does not even track the financial damage they cause. Research and development spending on the issue has fallen 47 percent over five years, while post-infection control costs have risen 2.4-fold.

Data submitted to People Power Party lawmaker Kang Seung-gyu of the National Assembly's Agriculture, Food, Forestry, Fisheries and Oceans Committee by the Rural Development Administration showed that not a single pesticide has been registered for plant virus control in the 14 years since registration standards were established in 2012. Only two applications have ever been filed, and both remain stuck in a supplementary review stage.

Once a plant is infected with a virus, treatment is extremely difficult, making prevention — removing infected plants and controlling vector insects — the primary management strategy. Yet with no registered pesticides available for virus control, farmers have few tools at their disposal.

Statistics needed to gauge the scale of damage are also lacking. The Rural Development Administration said it uses virus occurrence data only as guidance for farmers and does not separately calculate economic losses. Routine monitoring covers just five crops: rice, soybeans, chili peppers, napa cabbage and radish.

Meanwhile, of the 64 virus species newly identified in South Korea over the past decade, a large number were found in fruit crops — kiwi, grapes, peaches, apples, citrus, jujube and strawberries. Most of the crops where new viruses are being discovered fall outside the routine monitoring list.

In some crops, infection rates have climbed sharply. The virus infection rate in soybeans jumped sevenfold — from 0.50 percent in 2024 to 3.50 percent last year — the highest level in a decade. In North Chungcheong Province, the rate surged from 0.32 percent to 3.13 percent over the same period, a 9.8-fold increase. The radish infection rate also hit a 10-year high, rising from zero in 2023 to 2.63 percent last year.

New viruses continue to be detected domestically. Twenty-five plant virus species were identified in South Korea for the first time over the past five years — roughly one new species every 73 days on average. Of the five species reported last year, three were found in kiwi.

A rise in insects capable of spreading viruses adds to the concern. The number of chili thrips — a known vector pest — caught in citrus orchards on Jeju increased 5.6-fold, from 4.18 per trap in 2020 to 23.59 last year. A growing vector population raises the risk of wider virus spread.

Yet the R&D budget for virus response fell 47.3 percent, from 3.39 billion won ($2.55 million) in 2021 to 1.78 billion won last year. A key research project focused on reducing damage from fire blight and other pressing crop diseases also ended in 2024.

Over the past five years, 15.9 billion won was channeled into virus response research, yet no registered control pesticide available for farmers to purchase has emerged. Over the same period, post-infection control costs rose 2.4-fold, from 23 billion won to 54.7 billion won. The Rural Development Administration's own response plan through 2028 focuses on developing diagnostic methods and searching for candidate compounds — not delivering a finished product.

Fragmented oversight across multiple agencies was also flagged as a problem. The Rural Development Administration said data on virus efficacy labeling for organic farming materials falls under the National Agricultural Products Quality Management Service, while support records for affected farmers are handled by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs — leaving the administration without the relevant data itself.

"For 14 years, the government has failed to produce a single treatment, and it does not even know how much damage is being done," Kang said. "Farmers are plowing their fields under year after year with nothing in their hands."

Kang added that materials whose efficacy has been verified through national R&D should be made available to farmers in the field regardless of whether they have been certified as organic farming inputs. "We need to start properly compiling damage statistics and expand the monitoring scope to include fruit trees and greenhouse crops," he said.