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joinafrica features |
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SUDAN: LOCUSTS NOW THREATEN
DARFUR REGION
Khartoum, 25 August (AKI) - The locust
situation continues to be serious in western Sudan where hopper
bands and groups of immature adults of the crop-devouring
creatures are present in Darfur, a region already afflicted by
civil strife, the United Nations Food and Agriculture
Organisation (FAO) says in its latest update. Although survey
and control operations are in progress, many areas cannot be
accessed in the region, where tens of thousands of people have
been killed and millions displaced during two years of fighting
between the government, allied militia and rebels, it added.
In Eritrea, small groups of hoppers have formed on the Red Sea
coast near the border with Sudan where local breeding occurred
after unusually good rainfall and control operations are now
underway, FAO reported. Control operations were also carried out
recently against hopper infestations in the western Tigray
province of northern Ethiopia. Scattered adults are also
breeding in Yemen.
In West Africa, where infestations two years ago sparked fears
of a potentially worse crisis than the last plague nearly 20
years ago, only low numbers of immature and mature solitary
adults are present in parts of southern Mauritania, northern
Mali and Niger, where earlier damage caused by the locusts has
exacerbated a food crisis.
Although ecological conditions are unusually favourable for
breeding within a large portion of the northern Sahel region
bordering the Sahara, no hoppers have been found so far.
Nevertheless, intensive surveys must continue in order to detect
any signs that locust numbers might be increasing, FAO said.
On the other hand, local breeding has occurred in southern
Algeria west of Tamanrasset where scattered late hoppers and
immature adults were treated. Breeding is in progress and
scattered adults are present in Kanem, Batha and Wadi Fira
regions in Chad but the situation remains rather unclear because
of unconfirmed reports of swarms in some of these areas.
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