Climate change and weather conditions play an important role in locust breeding, the two headaches more seriously besetting Pakistan today than ever before. Previously, the locust swarms used to move to Iran after sometime, but this time they are still in Pakistan due to low temperatures. Given these conditions, the locusts breed and multiply. According to experts, total number of locusts in a swarm varies from a few hundred millions to several billions. In the past, when Pakistan was not a food-scarcity country, the locust swarms would be driven away to the sea by aircraft to die as they would descend on waves to spend the night. At local levels, the farmers do beat drums and burn stubbles to scare away locusts, but that is no answer to the magnitude of threat now besetting Pakistan. Locusts relish new vegetation, which is now in the form of wheat crop, and it is wheat that is now in short supply. So, even when it is late in recognising enormity of the locust threat the government must act by putting in place adequate anti-locust means and tools - fighting the locust is essentially a responsibility of the federal government. It should call for a national emergency. We must know that inaction on the part of concerned departments would encourage locusts to visit Pakistan regularly.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020