Entomology is among the first subjects taught at Nanjing Agricultural University. With a rich history over 100 years, the Department continues to thrive and grow. Early history of the Department dates back to the Teaching and Research Section established in 1916 at Jingling University, the Department of Plant Disease and Pest in 1921 at Southeast University as well. In July 1952, Departments of Plant Disease and Pest at Jingling University and National Central University merged into the Department of Plant Protection composed of insect section and plant disease section, along with the foundation of Nanjing Agricultural College. In October 2000, College of Plant Protection is formed with the Department of Entomology at Nanjing Agricultural University.

In terms of discipline, Agricultural Entomology and Pest Control is the earliest one established in China's agricultural colleges and universities. In 1986, discipline of Agricultural Entomology and Pest Control of our Department was approved to be the doctoral degrees conferring spot, and then was awarded as the key discipline by the Ministry of Agriculture and Jiangsu Province in 1992 and 1994, respectively. In 2002, it updated as the state key discipline. In 2017, discipline of Plant Protection at Nanjing Agricultural University was award as “A+” discipline in the 4th round of national discipline evaluation.

Our Department has innovative teaching and research faculty with awards as National Exemplary Teacher, Innovation Team of the Ministry of Agriculture, Provincial Prestigious Teacher Award, Jiangsu Province Outstanding Youth Fund. Our faculties address a broad range of issues involving insect molecular toxicology, insect physiology and molecular biology, insect informatic ecology, insect molecular ecology and evolution, biological control, and insect taxonomy of aquatic insects. Over the past decade, we have published articles in high quality journals such as Science, Nature Biotechnology, PNAS, Nature Communications and so on. Our scientific research achievements on integrative pest control were awarded two times the second prizes of National Scientific and Technological Progress as the second participant. Two doctoral dissertations of our Department were awarded 100 Excellent Doctoral Dissertations in China. Teaching is the first priority at our Department, we published several key national entomological textbooks such as "Agriculture Entomology" and "General Theory of Plant Protection". Through collaborative research and Joint culture of graduate students, our Department has established effective collaborations with institutes and universities in the United States, United kindom, Australia, France, Japan, South Korea, and so on. The Department offers basic and applied curriculum of entomology for undergraduate and graduate students, and also provides a variety of graduate program scholarships for perspective students.