UN: Act fast over locusts

2004-05-26 17:34

Rome - Despite major steps already taken to safeguard harvests in northwest Africa from locusts, further action is needed rapidly to deal with "very worrying" risks, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation warned on Wednesday.

The Rome-based FAO urged Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Niger and Senegal to move fast to monitor the possible arrival of desert locust swarms from the north, which could invade and ravage crops in the Sahel countries.

"Locusts are breeding in thousands of spots over large areas south of the Atlas Mountains stretching from Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia to western Libya," Clive Elliot, senior officer of the FAO locust group, said in an agency statement.

"Hoppers are forming bands and are at the last stage before they become adults. Swarms are likely to start forming from the end of this month. The winds are expected to carry a substantial number of locust adults and swarms south to the Sahel (...) where they could start to arrive in southern Mauritania, northern Senegal, Mali, Niger and Chad in about mid June," Elliot said.

Since October last year, a crop-growing area of 2.1m ha has been treated with insecticides in Algeria, Libya, Mauritania and Tunisia. However, said Elliott, "it is very difficult to find and treat all of the locust infestations in the vast and often remote desert areas."

The organisation pressed the governments of the five Sahel countries to make field surveillance teams ready to track down and undertake control operations where swarms of locusts may appear with the first summer rains.

In northern Mauritania, small swarms have already caused damage to the staple crops millet and sorghum, along with date palms and vegetables.

Several donor countries have offered to help tackle the problem and the FAO has taken measures to help the countries at risk in mobilising crop spraying from the air, vehicles, pesticides and training.

Since last October, locust control in the region has cost more than $40m, funded mainly by the affected nations, while the European Commission, Italy, Norway, Spain and the United States have contributed more than $5m.

Nevertheless, responses to an FAO appeal for a further $17m have been insufficient and "time is running out", the organisation warned.

"If these funds are not made available quickly, it is possible that the whole region will be subjected to a full-scale plague by the end of 2004," Elliot warned.

- AFP