The International Congress of Entomology (ICE) is held every four years in different countries in the world. In 2016, the conference was held in the Orange County Convention Centre in Orlando in Florida in USA from the 24th September – 1 October 2016. The conference was attended by 6,568 delegates from 102 countries. The conference serves as a forum for entomologists working on various aspects of entomology to interact and learn from each other.

The purpose of travel were:

Dr Mensah received an invitation by the Organising Committee of the International Congress of Entomology (ICE) to attend and organise Integrated Pest Management (IPM) symposium at the Conference held in Orlando in Florida, USA from 20 September to 30 September 2016.

to attend and present a paper on IPM in cotton cropping systems: Development and exploitation of a new semiochemical product for cotton IPM on transgenic cotton in Australia at the ICE Conference

Ruther activities included Dr Mensah meeting and discussing field experimentation, preliminary results and commercialization pathway of DAT 511 (a new NSWDPI Fungal Biopesticide product developed by Dr Robert Mensah) with Mr Mark Peacock (BASF Global Lead Researcher Biologicals). Mr Mark Peacock BASF-USA is lead researcher of the independent testing of DAT 511 against stink bugs on soybeans in Spain. BASF has indicated that the commercialization of DAT 511 product will depend on the results of the trials. Hence the need for Dr Mensah to visit Mr Peacock while in the USA to discuss DAT 511 trial protocols and review preliminary results.