In view of the deteriorating agricultural pollution caused by application of substantial chemical pesticides to control pest as well as failure control to due to pests resistance to the chemicals in Chinas major cotton producing areas, an IPM pilot project financed by Asian Development Bank and conducted by CABI was implemented in China's Tianmen City,Hubei Province from 1993 to 1996. This project was aimed at studying and developing an IPM technical system suited to Chinas major cotton producing areas in order to control pest damage and improve eco environment.Compared with the guideline and measures of China's plant protection system, the IPM project was more environmental protection oriented technically and more decentralized in terms of decision making (decision making by farmers), both of which were closely related. Theory and practices have proven that technical reform quite often leads to social reform and structural reform. The IPM project has two features in this respect: (a)Unlike the usual technical reform caused by land and population pressure, the IPM project was one caused by environmental pressure;(b) Technical reform used to be pulled back by the rural social structure, especially farmers' resistance to new technology while this IPM project met its major obstacle from highly centralized pest management system, namely the structural factor. The key to the problem is who makes decisions in pest management. Although farmers have the right to operate on their contracted land, they are not the decision makers for pest management of their own land. Because the farmer households are of small scale and separated from each other and cotton pests usually outbreak at a sudden, infect large areas of cotton and have a migratory feature, a highly centralized top to bottom management system has taken shape in Tianmen with the local authorities as the decision makers. Being held responsible for local cotton production, the local authorities take a very prudent attitude towards adoption of every integrated management measure.