Coconut is the crop of small and marginal farmers which is grown contiguously on their land holdings. Crop management is largely dependent on farmer to farmer extension as conventional extension system seldom looked into the contextual needs, need based delivery mechanisms for improving the efficacy of management in farmers gardens.

Black beetle, also termed as rhinoceros beetle owing to its horn like structure. is a major pest in coconut palms in all its growing stages.Rhinoceros beetle incidence in farmers field conditions is to the tune of 25 to 48 per cent in coconut seedlings and 23 per cent each in pre- bearing and bearing palms.The typical symptoms are the geometrical ‘V’ shaped cuttings in opened coconut fronds. The pest infestation results in loss of coconut seedlings and an yield loss of upto 10 percent in bearing palms. This calls for managing the pest over contiguous areas, involving community of farmers. Data indicated very low level of awareness and adoption regarding the bio control agents against the black beetle.

A participatory analysis with the communities, indicated that they prefer low cost, safer, environment friendly and bio-control practices to manage the pest, the reasons being as follows:

• In every coconut based homesteads this pest is ubiquitous in presence.
• Coconut trees are tall and require skilled coconut climbers for reaching the top, not only for harvest but also for cleaning the crown and adoption of plant protection measures.
• Existing extension mechanisms target only individual farmers as technology adoption units.
• Critical bio-inputs are not available and hence the knowledge and awarenessis also limited among the farmers.

Several indigenous technologies were in existence and in practice among coconut farmers, since the crop and the black beetle are associated historically. The traditional practices like incorporating Clerodendroninfortunatum, a weed plant in cowdung pits, compost units and coirpith heaps which are the breeding sites of rhinoceros beetle, hooking the beetle using a metal hook, applying mixture of equal quantities of crystal salt, ash and sand in the top most leaf axils, three times a year, were commonly practiced with good results as indicated by old generation farmers.These are no more practised presently. A need based social experimentation to evolve an efficient, feasible and up-scalable  model of Area Wide Community Extension Approaches (AWCA) in bio-management of coconut rhinoceros beetle (Oryctes rhinoceros Linn.) was therefore designed by the Agriculture Extension scientists of ICAR Central Plantation Crops Research Institute (CPCRI).