Jagadish Wagle

Ensuring food security has become a major challenge since the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic in December last year. The world has appeared to have paid huge attention to curbing the spread of COVID-19, health hazards and panic and less attention on basic requirements like food, work, income and livelihood. However, the severity of coronavirus has once again proved that food should be categorised a top priority as no one can function without food.
Food is a vital ingredient for human health and well-being as it fulfils our nutritional requirements. It is wrong to think that food is only stuff for filling belly. Besides, economics and politics of a nation are associated with food. The COVID-19 pandemic, natural calamities, climate change and food waste are the biggest challenges that should be addressed to ensure there is enough food supply across the globe.
The world has been facing unprecedented food insecurity from the invasion of swarms of locusts destroying millions of miles of agriculture, plants and fodder, especially in the Horn of Africa and beyond. This article underlines the issue of food security, which has been greatly challenged by the devouring behaviour of locust grasshoppers.

Invading Swarms
The swarms have added a serious threat to food insecurity especially in the Horn of Africa where millions of people are suffering from hunger. The COVID-19, Locusts and natural calamity have raised a question in achieving the goal of poverty alleviation and eradication of hunger as targeted in the Sustainable Development Goals By 2030, a global effort initiated by the United Nations. As a food-insecure country, Nepal has been entangled with COVID-19, locusts, and other man-made and nature-induced incidents creating a further challenge to the food system.

What are locusts?
Locusts belong to a family of grasshoppers called Acrididae. They are solitary and gregarious by nature. Locusts (Schistocercagregaria) can change their behaviour as per changing weather. The best deserving habitation of the locust is desert of the horn of Africa. Rain and moist on desert help them to proliferate. The gregarious ones, also known as desert locusts devastate crops, pasture and fodder while the solitary grasshopper does not destroy agriculture. Locusts do not attack people or animals.
The body size of a desert locust is roughly the same as the index finger of a man. In two weeks of hatching period, a female can lay 150 eggs within a single pod in the moistly desert. An adult locust can fly up to 93 miles in a single day with the direction of the wind.
As of June 2020, locusts sneaked more than 23 countries across Africa, Asia and the Middle East. The available moist and harvesting environment of May until July is a favourable condition for the breeding swarms. The first outbreak of locust occurred in Mauritania, Mali, Niger, and Sudan in 2003. It is said that, in October and November of 1988, a swarm of the desert locusts set off to the Caribbean and neighbouring parts of South America from West Africa, a journey of more than 3,100 miles just in 10 days. Approximately, 6 million years ago, a swarming locust is believed to have crossed the Atlantic Ocean from Africa to America.
Locusts are the biggest challenge of food insecurity because of their ability to destroy millions of acres of plant-based agriculture in an hour. However, they are also an edible insect. They can become a reliable source of food, income and employment if different approaches are made. The economic and social cost to control the invasion of the swarming locusts can be capitalised as an opportunity of adding food item in the list. Evidence shows that locusts have been eaten throughout history delicious food in many countries including Nepal.

Food Insecurity Threats
Despite the earlier prediction about locusts could not enter Nepal due to an unfamiliar weather condition, the sky above Kathmandu was covered by the migrating locusts in June. Farmers were bothered due to the lack of proper controlling mechanism.
According to the World Bank (WB), "A small swarm (1 km2) can be made up of 80 million locusts and can consume the same amount of food in one day as 35,000 people while a large swarm can eat up to 1.8 million metric tons of green vegetation, equivalent to food enough to feed 81 million people.’
Similarly, Taylor Maggiacomo and Kaya Lee Berne have mentioned for the National Geographic Magazine that a swarm contains “70 billion flying insects, covering 460 square miles - about 1.5 times the size of New York City - and devouring more than 300 million pounds of crops in one day.” According to the pieces of evidence, a swarm of about 192 billion locusts can cover at least 926.6 square miles area, which eats the same amount of food as 90 million people in one day. The swarms of plague can fly millions of miles far within a very short time.
The locust outbreaks in Ethiopia and Somalia are the worst in 25 years and Kenya in 75 years. And, India is witnessing its worst locust invasion in decades. According to the World Bank, the potential damages and losses from locust could reach as high as US$8.5 billion by the end of this year. In Nepal, it has been believed the invading insects damaged crops planted in 1100 hectors of land although the damage was not huge.
According to the WB within the wider East Africa region, 24 million people are food insecure and 8 million are internally displaced due to the damage to crops. Locusts also add a crisis to food insecurity where the people are battling with the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Combating Crisis
The impacts on the food cycle could drastically push people further into poverty by threatening livelihoods, plummeting people’s savings. According to the WB, the cost of response during the last major locust outbreak in 2003-05 in West Africa, grew from $1 million in June 2003 to $100 million just 14 months later.
Farmers used fumes and noise while locusts were encroaching cropland in Sindhulimadi of Nepal. The locals' efforts helped chase away about 80 per cent invading locusts. Indian farmers and locals were also advised of the same way of controlling the pests. Early warning preparedness and response against future locust outbreaks, surveillance, and vigilance, use of chemicals, fume and making noise are helpful methods to control locusts.
Using chemicals is the last resort as it is harmful to the residents and the environment. Constant research, study and communication feedback helps identify the swarm’s behaviour so that the remedies can be applied as needed. Also, research helps transform the approach to adopt locusts as a source of food business permanently.
As mentioned by The World Bank, The Emergency Locust Response Program (ELRP) with a sum of US$500 million have been initiated institutionally to provide as immediate assistance to the vulnerable victims and farmers, strengthen the regulatory framework and institutional capacity. Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, and Uganda were financed under the initial phase of the ELRP. Similarly, the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) is also working with affected countries.

Nepali Scenario
According to the sources, in May-June 2020, Eight million locusts had already been to 52 districts including Kathmandu. Recorded crop lost is 1100 ha. In the second week of July, a huge number of locusts had died in the high hilly parts of Nepal as the insect could not survive below 15-degree Celsius.
Thanks to the changing environment that prevented the swarm to come to Nepal from Africa through India. The locusts gave huge fear to us regarding food insecurity. The second wave of the swarm had entered the different parts of Nepal in the third week of July. In 1962, Nepal had her first experience of locust invasion in Dhading, Kathmandu and Nuwakot.
Similarly, in 1996, the swarms had destroyed 80 per cent of crops in Chitwan, and partially in Bara, Makwanpur and Mahottari districts. Now is a time to gear the initiatives up to save agriculture and farmer from locusts.

Global Efforts
Food is a great part of our nutritional stuff and is important in achieving human well-being. However, the food system in the world is severely stressed due to human greed and insensibility.
The locust and the COVID-19 pandemic crises have added serious threats to food security, income and livelihood of vulnerable people, creating a crisis within a crisis. Millions of destitute people in the world have starved while others have suffered from obesity. The imperfect global food system can be blamed for unequal outcomes.
Indeed, the total demand for agricultural products in 2030 will be about 60 per cent higher than today. Despite the need for more food, the world has been experiencing an unprecedented challenge to the existing food security system. It is a high time that the authorities across the globe initiated a unanimous global effort to resolve future challenges.
The global leadership should work together to tackle the global issues like the COVID-19, locust crisis and food insecurity by adhering to the time-tested adage, ‘United we stand, divided we fall’.

(Wagle is an expert on food security)