INDIAN CROPS AT RISK DURING ‘DOOMSDAY’ LOCUST OUTBREAK
▶ Authorities face criticism from farmers as swarms invade the country’s vital agricultural areas
Officials in India expect the country’s locust battle to continue as it faces its worst outbreak in three decades.
At least 10 swarms, each spread over a square kilometre, have destroyed more than 50,000 hectares of farmland, making it the worst outbreak since 1993.
Huge numbers of the insects entered India through Pakistan last month and reached the western state of Rajasthan this week, invading parts of the capital, Jaipur city.
Banker Ankur Parekh, 36, told that “it felt like doomsday” as the locusts reached the city.
“It was terrifying. I felt like I was in a sci-fi movie. They were everywhere,” he said.
Mr Parekh said residents banged metal kitchenware and set off firecrackers in an effort to drive the pests from trees and houses.
Locusts can fly up to 150 kilometres a day and a swarm of 40 million of the insects can eat as much food as 35,000 people in a single day, according to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation.
Indian authorities said swarms made their way into the country every year between July and October and blamed this year’s invasion on a failure to halt the insects as they passed through neighbouring countries.
“There is a mobilisation in the Horn of Africa, the Middle East, Iran, Saudi Arabia … locusts are widely prevalent and multiplying in these countries,” said KL Gurjar, deputy director at India’s Locust Warning Organisation.
“We are expecting the swarm to continue because these are coming from Pakistan and moving from spring breeding to summer breeding areas.”
Crops and trees have been destroyed in at least 18 districts in Rajasthan in recent weeks, with wind pushing the pests deeper into India’s key agricultural states such as Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.
Smaller swarms are active in the western states of Gujarat and Maharashtra.
Last year, about 25,000 hectares of crops were destroyed in Gujarat during a similar off-season attack that lasted until December.
Roxy Mathew Koll, a climate scientist at the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, said that outbreak could have resulted from heavy rains.
“Heavy rain triggers the growth of vegetation in arid areas where desert locusts can then grow and breed,” he said.
Scientists say the severity of the latest outbreak could also be a result of unusually warm weather in the Indian subcontinent, with temperatures reaching 50°C in western India.
Wind patterns have sent some swarms into cities and towns where the locusts have devoured bushes and trees.
Authorities have used drones, tractors and fire engines to spray pesticide and force the insects from the cities.
Many farmers in Uttar Pradesh have installed sound systems to play loud music in fields in an attempt to ward off the locusts. Police in affected areas also blast sirens and horns.
The Indian agriculture ministry has stepped up efforts to control the swarms, with farmers already under strain because of the nationwide lockdown imposed to curb the spread of coronavirus.
But farmers and experts have criticised the government’s slow response to the crisis and called on authorities to declare an emergency.
Devinder Sharma, an agriculture and trade policy expert, said the country’s farmers were under tremendous stress .
“Locusts leave destruction worse than drought, not only are the crops destroyed but even trees collapse under their weight,” he said.