by Marie Kauna – EMTV Online, Port Moresby
Farmers and fumigators in Argentina are facing a plague of locust described as the country’s worst in more than half a century.
Over past years, the country has recorded an increase in the number of insects that can destroy and affect crops.
While closer monitoring was taken out, farmers in the country last year have reported on the locust clouds that they described were more than four miles long and two miles high.
This has developed into what is now described as the worst locust problem experienced in the country, thus affecting many.
To help destroy the locust, the country’s provincial authority, along with the agricultural inspection agency Senasa, have increased their efforts to help eliminate the swarms of locust in the dry forests of northern Argentina.
Although efforts are made, there is a need for more to help mitigate the outbreak in the country.
Farmers in the country are blaming the country’s previous government of former President, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, saying the officials have failed to consider the warning on the locust plague in Africa caused by climate change.
While the outbreak is closely monitored, there is no study as yet that indicates the cause of the outbreak.
Paola Carrizo, a professor of Agronomy at the University of Buenos Aires, explained that insufficient pest control was most likely one of the causes to this outbreak.
