Therefore, extension agents have long advocated sanitary disposal of diseased plants and careful use of cultural knives and tools. It is recommended that knives be either flamed in a fire or laid in the sun for 2 days before touching another plant. However, farmers often prune entire plantations over a few day period without sterilizing their knives. Also, it is common to cut a leaf from several plants when needing a clean work space for processing Enset , when a sudden rain shower calls for an umbrella or when trying to pass through entangled leaves. No published reports, however, show survival of the wilt bacteria in the acid condition of the fermentation process.
Most farmers are aware of their infected plants and many insist that they do avoid passive spread.
Some were even smart enough to recognise that removal of diseased plants could, in itself, be a spreading mechanism by contact with healthy plants. One farmer even wraps the diseased plants with cloth to avoid insects which could spread the bacteria by contact. Perhaps the best procedures have yet to be explored but could involve isolating plants as soon as diseased, followed by removal on a periodic basis and subsequent sterilisation of tools. Consistent denial of unsanitary use of knives by some farmers and the presence of wilt infected plants where farmers do not even prune plants has led the author to suspect other means of spread. It was also noted that wilt infected plants were most numerous near the fence rows, property boundaries and pasture areas.