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Locust Plague to Be Under Control
An autumn plague of locust, which has damaged more than 933,000 hectares of the country's farmland so far this year, is expected to be brought under control by the end of the month, the Ministry of Agriculture announced over the weekend.
However, experts warn that the country could face a tougher job of combating migratory locust in the future, given that severe droughts are expected to hit more regions in the years to come.
Fueled by a chronic dry spell, locust have appeared in large numbers along the Yellow and Huaihe rivers. Locust have also been a problem in mostly uncultivated land and beaches in Shandong, Hebei and Henan provinces and the city of Tianjin, according to Zhu Enlin, division director of the ministry's Agro-Technical Extension Centre.
The density of locust reached 1,500 per square-metre in Henan Province, he said.
To make matters worse, Asian migratory locust from Kazakhstan have "invaded" Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region twice since July, aggravating the locust plague in the area, according to a document made available to China Daily yesterday.
To scale back economic and ecological losses, China has deployed biological prevention and ecological control means, plus insecticide-spraying programmes this year.
The total amount of damage caused by the locust is not yet known. Zhu said that since the locust were confined to beaches and uncultivated land, and only damaged crops in sporadic fields, the damage to the country's agriculture industry could be slight.
At least one crop-dusting plane, more than 30,000 pesticide sprayers and 1,000 tons of pesticides were used this autumn to kill the invaders, according to statistics from the ministry.
"By September 7, provinces including Anhui, Jiangsu, Henan, Shanxi and Shaanxi had put an end to their insect-killing campaigns, with Hebei, Shandong and Tianjin having brought over 90 per cent of the locust-affected areas under control," said the document.
The nationwide battle is scheduled to end this month, Zhu said.
The Ministry of Agriculture has sent a special team to Kazakhstan to conduct a 10-day on-the-spot investigation, and seek ways to enhance technological co-operation to curb locust from migrating into China in the future, according to sources at the centre.
Since China's long drought is expected to continue, experts project that the locust plague will worsen, especially in regions along the Yellow River, Bohai Rim and the western parts of Hainan Island.
(www.chinadaily.com.cn)
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