Tag: swarms of locusts

21 districts of the country remained affected from the swarms of locusts, said Makhdoom Khusro Bakhtiar during a meeting of Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations.

'The provincial authorities have failed to take concrete measures to eliminate locusts'

The locusts have attacked standing crops of wheat, mustard and potatoes on hundreds of acres farmlands in Kumair, Harappa, Bangla, Cheechawatani and other areas of the region.

The provincial government made its demand in a meeting between the Chief Secretary of Sindh Syed Mumtaz Ali Shah and Federal Secretary of the Ministry of National Food Security Muhammad Hashim Popalzai in Karachi.

The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) in first week of September had warned that the situation relating to locusts in Pakistan was “most serious” as a second generation of the insect had been bred.

The swarms of the crop eating insects can be witnessed at houses, trees and fruit farms in various parts of the city and the outskirts.

Local farmers were trying to push them out of the area on self help basis with traditional means including beating metal cans.

Several swarms of locusts descended in the area and eat up standing cotton crop, vegetables and fodder for cattle in the area, local people complained.

According to the FAO’s Locust Watch report, there remains a risk of further breeding, causing locust numbers to increase, with the possibility of swarm formation from late September onward.

Locusts have formed plagues since prehistory. The ancient Egyptians carved them on their tombs and the insects are mentioned in ancient books and religious scriptures.