KARACHI: People in several districts of Sindh have reported descend of swarms of locusts, species of grasshoppers, which are severe threat to many agricultural crops, ARY News reported on Tuesday.
Swarms of locusts have spread to several districts of Sindh including Nawabshah, Naushehro Feroz, Sanghar, Mirpur Khas, Jamshoro after initially descending in Khairpur from Balochistan, sparking fears of large-scale crop devastation in barrage areas of the province.
Chief Secretary of Sindh has chaired a meeting here, attended by the officers of agriculture and revenue departments, to review the situation and planning to prevent the locust attack.
The meeting also decided to survey the affected areas to assess damage to the crops.
According to reports, the swards of locusts have inflicted damage to cotton, dates and other crops, vulnerable to the damaging insect.
There are social media photographs and videos of locusts flying and resting around agricultural fields in a number of Sindh districts.
The cultivators organizations have express their serious concerns that if the authorities failed to control the locusts, the agriculture sector would suffer huge financial loss in billions of rupees.
It is feared that locusts will be able to destroy the agricultural belt of Sindh if they enter Mirpurkhas, Tando Allahyar, Matiari, Hyderabad and other districts on the left bank of Indus River.
According to reports, locusts first landed in Khairpur’s desert area of Nara after flying there from Balochistan. The federal government then identified 30 spots in the area where locusts were still present.
Officials said that locusts had invaded the district’s desert area after having plagued Yemen, Saudi Arabia and Iran in a row before ending up in Balochistan.
Aerial spray was done by the department of plant protection in Khairpur. Spots which were identified stretched over 20km area where around 2,600 hectares land was brought under cotton cultivation this year.
Sindh’s lower region has vast orchards of banana, mangoes, dates etc and fields of cotton and sugarcane. Agriculture officials fear if the attack was not controlled it would destroy cotton crop and damage banana and sugarcane crops.
