Eat them, poison them, or drive them to cannibalism - as a second wave of locusts threaten to devour East Africa's crops, scientists in a Nairobi lab are experimenting with new ways to kill them
NAIROBI, - Eat them, poison them, and use scent to drive them to cannibalism - as a second wave of locusts threatens to devour East Africa’s crops, scientists in a Nairobi lab are experimenting with novel ways to kill them.
Swarms are the worst for three generations, encouraged by unseasonably wet weather and dispersed by a record number of cyclones. The destructive pests could cost East Africa and Yemen $8.5 billion this year, the World Bank has said. So scientists at the International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology are experimenting with biopesticides and the use of locusts as human and animal food as they look for environmentally-friendly extermination methods.
Now researchers are pouring through 500 other fungi and microbes in their bio bank in the hope of discovering another locust poison.Before locusts can fly they have a certain chemistry and therefore a unique smell that allows them to remain in a group, he said. That smell changes as locusts mature.“They get disoriented, the group breaks into pieces, they cannibalize each other and they become even more susceptible to biopesticides,” he said.
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