Fears for food security as locust swarms arrive in South Sudan
KENYAN farmer Mwende Kimanzi said planes started spraying desert locusts as soon as they appeared, but it was not enough to save her crops.
The 38-year-old mother of three said the locusts landed in her fields two weeks ago, and since then they have been eating their way through her sorghum, millet and lentils while she tries to chase them away.
The swarms, first sighted in December, have already destroyed tens of thousands of hectares of farmland in Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia, threatening food supplies in the worst locust invasion in 70 years.
Usually Kimanzi sells the lentils and keeps the rest for her family, but the locusts’ arrival in Kyuso, about 200km east of the capital, Nairobi, means they could soon go hungry.
Farmers called the authorities as soon as the locusts arrived.
The authorities used planes to spray the swarm, and while some died, most ended up in Kimanzi’s fields.
“The aeroplanes started the spraying from that edge of the river. Some died, but the rest of the swarm moved to our farms. They destroyed everything here. They have now moved to our homes. They are now laying eggs there,” Kimanzi said.
She has only managed to harvest one bag of millet and one bag of lentils since the locust invasion.
“The rest of the crops were all destroyed,” she said. “There is nothing left. We will still face hunger.”
The swarms of locusts that were wreaking havoc across East Africa had also arrived in South Sudan, the government said, threatening more misery in one of the world’s most vulnerable nations.
Their breeding has been spurred by one of the wettest rainy seasons in the region in four decades.
Experts have warned that the main, March-to-May cropping season is at risk. Eggs laid along the locusts’ path are due to hatch and create a second wave of the insects in key agricultural areas.
The arrival of the locusts could be catastrophic in South Sudan, where war, followed by drought and floods, has already left 6 million people, or 60% of the population, facing severe hunger.
Agriculture Minister Onyoti Adigo Nyikiwec said the locusts had crossed the eastern border with Uganda on
Monday. “The report came that these are mature.
“As you know, locusts are like human beings; they send their reconnaissance ahead of time to ascertain whether there is food or not, and if the area is good for breeding.”
Earlier this month, Somalia declared a national emergency over the invasion.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation says the current invasion is known as an “upsurge”, the term for when an entire region is affected. However, if the invasion cannot be rolled back and spreads, it becomes known as a “plague” of locusts.
There were six major desert locust plagues in the 1900s, the last of which was in 1987-89. The last major upsurge was in 2003-05.