This week a very well known and much respected member of the international pest control industry finds himself in the Talking Pest Management hot seat – Serge Simon.

Serge is managing director of Edialux in France and has been an active member in the pest control industry for over 30 years. His company is not only a member of the French and also the Swiss trade associations, but Serge has also played an active role within CEPA (Confederation of European Pest Management Associations) and is on the CEPA board of directors.

He relates how he has always considered training to be fundamental, in fact Edialux was the first company to set up courses in France. He stresses that his purpose in life has never been to talk about himself, but talk about what you are useful for. The same applies to a pest control company – stress the importance and relevance of what you do protecting public health – how many lives you have saved.

Likewise for CEPA – validate its worth and contribution within public hygiene. Dispel the idea that the industry is just users of biocides. Biocides are simply one part of the job – one tool in the tool box. The first key thing is always to establish the cause of any pest problem.

This sentiment leads seamlessly into a discussion regarding the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) and the significance of Integrated Pest Management (IPM). Serge describes IPM as simply using the right tool, be it a biocide, physical proofing activities, cleaning, even training, at the right time.
For the MoU, Serge neatly sums up its objective as creating an agreement – an agreement on one side between the person using pest management services, and on the other, the person doing the pest management.

Demonstrating his long term commitment to the industry, Serge says: “Not only is this a business, its role is to protect and take care of people.”