This book is a synthesis and a celebration of a large body of agro-ecological research carried out on the management of the pests of cotton, one of the world's major crops and one which has historically been a very heavy consumer of inputs of pesticides. It demonstrates how agro-ecological approaches to pest management are at last approaching the "mainstream", with an increasing recognition that farmland delivers a wide range of ecosystem services (nature's goods and services), including but certainly not solely comprising the production of food. Contents: I - The new issues in crop protection: Reducing harvest losses still further; Learning the lessons of the first Green Revolution; Advancing the concept of rational crop protection; Ensuring the maintenance of biodiversity and the sustainable functioning of agro-ecosystems. II - Cotton, a case study: Cotton and its cultivation; Insects and weeds, major constraints to cotton production; Sensitivity to pests and damage and the compensation capacity of cotton. III - Stepping off the pesticide treadmill: uccess and disillusionment, or the Need for Know-how; Towards supervised chemical control; Management of the phenomenon of resistance to pesticides; Crop protection at the crossroads. IV - The concept of integrated control: Control, suppression, eradication, management or protection?; eradication of cotton pests; Considerations for IPM in cotton cultivation. V - Harmonising control methods, mirage and reality: Optimising varietal selection and transforming living organisms; Foreseeing the development of resistance; Exploiting natural plant defences and promoting biological control. VI - Ecological bases of the management of populations: Think globally, act locally; Combining productivity and the provision of ecological services; Towards agroecological management of communities. VII - Habitat management: the factor uniting agronomy and ecology: Agronomic and agroecological innovations in cotton production; Controlling o