the locusts are coming

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sulawesigirl4

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I don't know if anyone is aware of this, but there is a swarm of locusts covering an area of approximately the USA coming towards us here in Sub-Saharan Africa. They eat everything green in sight and destroy crops. It could be quite a threat for the people here if they were to lose this year's harvest, food supplies and whatnot. :( The funny thing is that scientists predicted this was coming as far away as last year and the poor countries like Mauritania and Mali have been asking for foreign aid to help them eradicate these pests before they could fly, but it hasn't happened.

BBC link here
 
out of sight, out of mind.

i should say, however, i believe i have heard something about this.
 
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Well what makes it all so maddening is that it is a problem that could have been solved but apparently is not glamourous enough for international donors to want to help fund the preventative measures. Instead they will wait until the locusts have come and wiped out all the crops and then step in and give food aid when the famine comes. This in a place where subsistence farming can provide enough food for people, normally.

I can tell you that it's an awful feeling to be sitting here in Mali and waiting for the hordes to descend in a month or so. We had been waiting and waiting for the rains to start, worrying that there would not be enough for a good harvest this year, they have finally come but are less than last year, and then what should be upon us but the means to lose everything people have worked for. This country (and many others in the area) are too poor to begin with and do not have the means to effectively fight this plague.

By Ibrahima Sylla

Nouakchott - Nearly a million people in West Africa face famine unless they get international aid to battle swarms of locusts devouring their crops in the region's worst plague in 15 years, farmers and government experts warned.

The locusts are sweeping into crop-growing areas of the Sahel, on the Sahara's southern fringe, a region whose people are mostly subsistence farmers and whose governments lack the means to fight the infestation.

A fraction of a swarm can eat the same amount in a day as 10 elephants, 25 camels or about 2 500 people, experts say, destroying subsistence crops such as sorghum and millet as well as money earners like water melons and groundnuts.

"We have to expect a deficit in our cereal crop of around 80 percent. What's more, 600 000 to 800 000 people will be affected by famine," Mohamed Lemine, an official from Mauritania's national agriculture federation, told reporters late on Saturday.

"If steps are not taken we can't hope for any harvest this year," another senior federation official said.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation warned as long ago as October that locust swarms threatened to wreak havoc on the region after exceptional rains and humidity following several years of drought allowed the insects to flourish.

But the response has fallen woefully short. The FAO said two weeks ago that damage from the airborne invasion could triple to $245 million within a year if no emergency aid is provided soon.

It put immediate aid needs at $80-million and said just $9-million had been pledged so far.

Mauritania and Niger both say they need up to $20-million, extra aircraft to spray crops, and hundreds of thousands more litres of pesticide to contain the plague.

The last major plague in 1987-89 started in western Sudan, but hit 28 nations and spread as far as India, meaning even countries not yet infested are preparing for the worst.

...
rest of story here

There's a pretty informative article here as well.
 
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