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Dimapur, May 27 (EMN): Even as India battles the Covid-19 pandemic, a new potential threat -- desert locust -- has surfaced in some parts of India, which by now has done immense damage to the crops and vegetation in the country.
However, entomologists in Nagaland believe that the locust may not pose as much threat to Nagaland like it does to other states, saying that the pest may not reach the state given the nature of the region.
Speaking to Eastern Mirror, an entomologist from the School of Agriculture Science and Rural Development (SASRD) Nagaland, Akato Chishi, said that the desert locust will be a threat to Nagaland even if it reaches the state as the foods we produce are mostly subsistence, without capability to commercialise it.
Chishi maintained that most north-eastern states do not experience attacks from swarms of locust mainly because of the climate factor. He added that it would be ‘unlikely’ for the locust to reach Nagaland. However, he said that the result of destructions and losses would be same as other states if the pest reaches the state.
He pointed out that controlling large swarms of locusts would be a difficult task as there is no effective pesticide, particularly for this pest. He believed that if the locusts manage to reach Nagaland, “we may have not many options but wait for it to go past our land”.
Another entomologist in the department of Argiculture, Akam Zeliang, said that the locust was not a new thing in India, and that it mostly originates from Rajasthan. He however pointed out that the present swarm of locusts had gone past Rajasthan, which was very unusual to its nature, making it a matter of concern.
However, the entomologist said that the locust takes time to move from one place to another. He added that the pest has certain life-cycle and that even if they re-produce, there is a high probability that the swarm of locusts will not reach Nagaland.
According to him, if the locusts manage to reach Nagaland, it could be controlled by a method called light trap. He said that the pest is usually attracted to lights, and thus can be controlled at night by using the method.
Large agricultural landowners and farmers can start preparing for a possible eventuality by setting up light traps at specific points and places so that they can separate the locust from the farm lands, the entomologist said.
On a lighter note, he said that Nagas started catching and eating locusts when it arrived Nagaland in the past. However, he said that locust is not advisable for human consumption as it might possibly be carrying some parasites or pathogens.
According to the Directorate of Plant Protection, Quarantine and Storage, the desert locust lives a total of about three to five months. It is one of about a dozen species of short-horned grasshoppers that are known to change behaviour and form swarms of adult or bands of hoppers. The scientific name for desert locust is Schistocerca gregaria.