The United Nations Food and
Agriculture Organization (FAO) today
urgently appealed for $22 million to tackle the locust plague that has already
infested over half of Madagascar’s cultivated land and pastures and threatens
to trigger a severe food crisis in the island nation.
Funding is needed to start a
large-scale control campaign in time for the next crop planting season in
September, the agency stated in a news release,
adding that its emergency appeals for Madagascar remain “severely underfunded.”
With the plague “largely
uncontrolled”, FAO expects that two-thirds of the country will be infested by
locusts by September. At stake are the food security and livelihoods of some 13
million people, or nearly 60 per cent of the population. Nine million of those
people are directly dependent on agriculture for food and income.
“If we don’t act now, the plague could
last years and cost hundreds of millions of dollars. This could very well be a
last window of opportunity to avert an extended crisis,” said FAO
Director-General José Graziano da Silva, who stressed that prevention and early
action are key.
The agency pointed out that timely
control of the locust upsurge in Madagascar at an early stage would have cost
$14.5 million in 2011-2012. However, FAO only received half the necessary
funding. Another campaign had to be launched, but that received barely a
quarter of the required funds in 2011-2012, it added.
Funding will need to be allocated by
July to have all the supplies and personnel in place to mount a wide-scale
anti-locust campaign starting in September, FAO said.
“FAO’s locust control programme needs
to be fully funded in order to monitor the locust situation throughout the
whole contaminated area and to carry out well-targeted aerial control
operations,” stated the agency.
“Otherwise, undetected or uncontrolled
locust populations will continue to breed and produce more swarms. The plague
would therefore last several years, controlling it will be lengthier and more
expensive and it will severely affect food security, nutrition and
livelihoods.”
The full programme that is needed to
return the locust plague to a recession requires over $41.5 million over the
next three years. The programme includes: improving the monitoring and analysis
of the locust situation; large-scale aerial and ground spraying and related
training; monitoring and mitigating the effect of control operations on health
and the environment; and measuring the impact of anti-locust campaigns and the
damages to crops and pasture.
A recent FAO assessment mission on the
impact of the current locust plague in Madagascar found that rice and maize
losses due to the locusts in some parts of the country vary from 40 to 70 per
cent of the crop, with 100 per cent losses on certain plots.
A joint UN crop and food security
assessment mission is currently on the ground to measure the locust’s damages
to food security and livelihoods. More detailed data analysis will be available
in July, but the resources to start preparation for the field actions have to
be available now, FAO stressed.
The agency estimates
that losses in rice production could be up to 630,000 tonnes, or about 25 per
cent of total demand for rice in Madagascar. Rice is the main staple in the
country, where 80 per cent of the population lives on less than a dollar per
day. DEVEX
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