A REVIEW OF THE POTENTIAL CLIMATE CHANGE IMPACT ON INSECT POPULATIONS – GENERAL AND AGRICULTURAL ASPECTS

Considering insect populations, we can see that climate change affects in many ways: it can cause a shift in geographical spread (Porter et al., 1991; Ward and Masters, 2007), abundance (Ayres and Lombardero, 2000; Olfert and Weiss, 2006) or diversity (Conrad et al., 2002; Feehan et al., 2009; Sharon et al., 2001), it can change the location, the timing and the magnitude of outbreaks of pests (Volney and Fleming, 2000), and it can define the phenological or even the genetic properties of the species (Gordo and Sanz, 2006; Klok and Chown, 2001; Parmesan, 2007). Long-time investigations of special insect populations, simulation models and scenario studies give us very important information about the response of the insects far away and near to our century. Getting to know the potential responses of insect populations to climate change makes us possible to evaluate the adaptation of pest management alternatives as well as to formulate our future management policy.