Allé'Fraise project: Development of allelopathy for the agro-ecological transition of strawberry production in the region Centre Val-de-Loire)

Since the ban on metam sodium, a very broad-spectrum fumigant, at the end of 2018, strawberry growers have been faced with a major crisis, and the available alternatives are unsatisfactory. Allelopathy to limit soil bio-aggressors (fungi, bacteria, insects, nematodes, weeds) is an agroecological alternative that has proved its worth in field crops, but also in tropical crops. This approach uses service plants that have a positive effect on the crop in place by releasing chemical compounds. The Allé'Fraise project (2021-2024, funded by the Centre Val-de-Loire Regional Council) aims to design ways of using service plants (co-culture, previous crop, then mulch and/or burial of plants) in technical management, and more specifically on the soil strawberry model. However, there are factors that alter the effectiveness of allelopathy that need to be controlled through research into the associated mechanisms. The Allé'Fraise project therefore has two parts: 1) series of pathotests under controlled conditions to measure the factors that will be effective in the field: dose, type and disinfection cycle, variety, duration. 2) field trials of crop designs based on the results of the pathotests to assess strawberry production: yield, mass and number of fruits, etc.".