So we’re fighting a coronavirus pandemic.
But what about the swarms?
“An enemy far more lethal than any human force.”
Even in bad Hollywood movies bugs make our skin crawl.
But when they're real
and there's a COVID-19 pandemic
that's a huge problem that just got worse.
And right now the UN says swarms
some as big as a city
are eating their way through Pakistan
and the Horn of Africa.
So can we stop this plague of locusts?
Or will the coronavirus ruin any chance
of getting these swarms under control?
So while we’ve been stuck inside
because of the coronavirus
outside there’s been a plague of locusts.
Locusts are like grasshoppers on steroids.
Under the right conditions some of these
members of the grasshopper family morph into locusts.
This plague is threatening the crops
and livelihoods of tens of millions of people.
Kenya hasn’t had it this bad in 70 years.
Ethiopia and Somalia haven’t seen anything like it in 25.
Locusts are also in Eritrea, Uganda and South Sudan.
The threat dates back to 2018
when wet weather led to a population explosion.
And with the rainy season the UN says
the number of locusts could increase by 20 times.
If you imagine that in one square kilometre
you have 50 million individuals
then you can calculate how many there are.
You have billions and billions of locusts.
And the timing is horrible.
Their arrival in the Horn of Africa
coincides with the main planting season.
“Cleared to drop.”
In South Sudan — even before the locusts invaded
5.3 million people couldn’t get enough to eat.
A peace deal had raised the prospect of more farmers
planting this season. But now…
So what’s behind the swarm? Why now?
Well many people say it’s shifting weather patterns
because of global warming.
So we looked into it.
Big cyclones in the Arabian Peninsula are rare.
There’ve only been three in the last 50 years.
That was until May 2018.
That’s when Cyclone Mekunu hit
followed by Cyclone Luban only five months later.
Together they dumped enough water
across four countries to create
an ideal breeding ground for the locusts.
Probably enough for about three generations
of breeding over a nine-month period.
So that’s roughly about an 8,000-fold increase in locusts
in between June of 2018 and March of 2019.
Then last December another
cyclone hit northeastern Somalia and eastern Ethiopia.
Is it all because of climate change?
Hard to say 100%. But what we do know is this.
There's a climate system that affects that part of the world.
It’s called the Indian Ocean Dipole.
When it turns to positive phase
it causes more extreme rainfall and more frequent cyclones
and what scientists think is happening is that
climate change is making this positive phase of the IOD
more frequently happening.
If this trend continues then, yeah
we’re going to get more locust outbreaks.
So how exactly do these conditions
create swarms of desert locusts?
Well when it looks like a grasshopper it’s green
prefers to be alone and can’t fly far.
But bunched together
like when they start to run out of food
there’s the potential for real trouble.
Crowding causes the grasshoppers to
brush up against each other.
And can activate special hairs on their back legs
that send signals to the bug’s central nervous system.
It releases a neurotransmitter called serotonin
that triggers all sorts of changes
in how the grasshoppers behave — and how they look.
They develop larger wings, turn yellow.
And grow to about the size of your index finger.
Even their brains get bigger.
They don’t get smarter but their behaviour changes.
And they change from being a solitary animal
to a gregarious animal.
That’s one of the changes.
But the other change is also that
they eat many more different plants.
They also like to move more.
As underdeveloped insects they live in about 30 countries.
But transformed the desert locust can
spread to twice that many.
They can end up as far as Portugal and Spain.
And now they’ve moved into Pakistan. 
The government there has declared a state of emergency
because agriculture represents about
one-quarter of GDP.
And the COVID-19 pandemic is complicating things.
In Somalia pesticides expected at the end of March
have been delayed because of cargo flight restrictions.
In Kenya lockdowns have messed up
the delivery of pesticides.
Fewer flights mean shipping costs have reportedly
tripled in some cases.
To control the swarms people in the past
have actually suggested using giant nets, flamethrowers
lasers and huge vacuums.
Some say we should just eat them.
I’m told locusts are a good source of protein.
But there’s no way anyone
is eating their way out of this plague.
There are just too many of them.
And you also have to watch that
you don’t pick the wrong ones.
Of course you can eat them, no problem.
Except you have to be careful when they are sprayed
because of course you poison people.
Insecticides are controversial.
But they’re the only thing that seems to work.
For the first time in Africa
they’re trying out a bio-pesticide
based on fungus.
They say it isn’t harmful to people or the environment.
There are other issues though.
Finding the locusts can be tough.
Africa is bigger than Canada, the US
and China combined.
Where do you have your pesticides?
Where do you have your planes?
Where do you have your cars?
So it’s really a logistic nightmare to control them.
And using insecticides also requires
specially trained people for precision spraying.
Right now that’s just not happening
because of the coronavirus ban on groups.
It’s like a very well-choreographed
dance in fact.
And if one thing is missing
the dance is a flop.
These locusts are a threat to millions of people.
Some are already starving.
And now those same people
are bracing themselves for COVID-19.
A plague or a pandemic on its own is a disaster.
But together it’s hard to imagine how people
will cope without some sort of help.
“We don’t know when we’ll be back on
the Start Here set but not to worry.
We’re still going to be bringing you more episodes
any way we can.
In the meantime our website aljazeera.com
has all the latest on the coronavirus pandemic.
I’ll see you next week.”
