Locusts ‘may spread to 50 countries’

Press, 14 June 1978, Page 9

Locusts ‘may spread to 50 countries’

NZPA-Reuter Rome Some 50 nations from the Atlantic to the Himalayas may face a full-scale locust plague unless Ethiopia and Somalia take immediate action against their own serious outbreaks, the Food and Agriculture Organisation has said. Edouard Saouma, directorgeneral of the United Nations specialised agency, added in a statement at F.A.O. headquarters in Rome that if the two nations did not keep their plagues from spreading, seasonal winds might carry swarms of the insect as far as Morocco in the west and Iran and Pakistan in the east, Mr Saouma declared that the infestation was so serious in Ethiopian and Somali areas already ravaged by drought, civil strife and war that the two countries should consider it a national emergency.

In Dar-es-Salaam, John i Malecela, chairman of the ; Desert Locust Control Or- . ganisation for East and Cen--1 tral Africa, announced earl- ■ ier that he had sent Mr i Saouma an urgent appeal for I extra financial and other i help in fighting the plague which he said was threat- ■ ening Ethiopia with famine. 1 Mr Malecela, also Tan- , zania’s Agriculture Minister, t added that if the Ethiopian ; and Somali plagues were not i ended within two months i they also would spread to > his country and Kenya, : causing havoc. i The F.A.O. director-gen- - eral urged other nations to help Ethiopia and Somalia t fight their outbreaks. Sixteen > years ago, he added, locust • outbreaks had almost been J brought under control but * now unusual ecological con- [ ditions favoured locust breeding.