East Africa’s worst locust plague in 70 years spreads to South Sudan where millions are starving
- The swarm spawned on Ethiopia-Somalia border and has ballooned in number
- Plague’s path of destruction has gone through Kenya, Djibouti, Eritrea and Sudan
- Around 2,000 have now been spotted in Eastern Equatorial state, south Sudan
- Fears grass-guzzling insects could compound starvation in war-torn country
East Africa’s worst locust plague in 70 years has reached South Sudan, panicking authorities who fear the outbreak will compound starvation in the war-torn nation.
Since the swarm spawned on the Ethiopia-Somalia border, the pests have flown a path of destruction through Kenya, Djibouti, Eritrea, Tanzania, Sudan.
Their number has ballooned into the billions which has left governments scrambling to stop them laying waste to crops.
Around 2,000 of the desert locusts have now been spotted in the Eastern Equatorial state of South Sudan, the agriculture minister Onyoti Adigo said.
The potentially devastating effects of the grass-guzzling insects was spelled out by the country’s UN representative Meshack Malo.
The desert locusts in this arid patch of northern Somalia look less ominous than the billion-member swarms infesting East Africa, but the hopping young locusts are the next wave in the outbreak that threatens more than 10 million people across the region with a severe hunger crisis
Since the swarm spawned on the Ethiopia-Somalia border, the pests have flown a path of destruction through Kenya, Djibouti, Eritrea, Tanzania, Sudan, before now reaching South Sudan
At this stage ‘if we are not able to deal with them … it will be a problem,’ he said.
Droughts and flood following a bitter civil war have left 60 per cent of the population suffering hunger.
Malo added: ‘These are deep yellow which means that they will be here mostly looking at areas in which they will lay eggs.’
Experts have warned the main March-to-May cropping season is at risk as eggs laid along the locusts’ path are due to hatch and create a second wave of the insects in key agricultural areas.
The locusts have travelled in swarms the size of Moscow and it has been said the only effective control is aerial spraying with pesticides.
Adigo said: ‘We are training people who will be involved in spraying and also we need chemicals for spraying and also sprayers.
‘You will also need cars to move while spraying and then later if it becomes worse, we will need aircraft.’
A young desert locust that has not yet grown wings is stuck in a spider’s web on a thorny bush in the desert near Garowe, in the semi-autonomous Puntland region of Somalia
Desert locusts jump up from the ground and fly away in Nasuulu Conservancy, northern Kenya
Other countries have employed aircraft to spray the swarms, while desperate locals have employed tactics like banging pots and pans or shooting at them.
But UN and local authorities have said more aircraft and pesticides are required, with $76million needed urgently.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday during a visit to Ethiopia said the U.S. would donate another $8million to the effort. That follows an earlier $800,000.
The number of locusts could grow up to 500 times by June, when drier weather begins, experts have said.
Until then, the fear is that more rains in the coming weeks will bring fresh vegetation to feed a new generation of the voracious insects.
South Sudanese ministers called for a collective regional response to the outbreak that threatens to devastate crops and pasturage.
There have been six major desert locust plagues in the 1900s, the last of which was in 1987-89. The last major upsurge was in 2003-05.
Ranger Gabriel Lesoipa is surrounded by desert locusts as he and a ground team relay the coordinates of the swarm to a plane spraying pesticides, in Nasuulu Conservancy, northern Kenya
As locusts by the billions descend on parts of Kenya in the worst outbreak in 70 years, authorities are flying low over affected areas in small planes and spraying pesticides in what experts call the only effective control