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posted by Fnord666 on Monday February 24 2020, @08:01AM   Printer-friendly
from the eating-their-way-through dept.

Locust swarms arrive in South Sudan, threatening more misery:

Swarms of locusts which are wreaking havoc across East Africa have now arrived in South Sudan, the government said Tuesday, threatening more misery in one of the world's most vulnerable nations.

Billions of desert locusts, some in swarms the size of Moscow, have already chomped their way through Ethiopia, Somalia, Kenya, Djibouti, Eritrea, Tanzania, Sudan and Uganda.

Their breeding has been spurred by one of the wettest rainy seasons in the region in four decades.

Experts have warned the main March-to-May cropping season is at risk. Eggs laid along the locusts' path are due to hatch and create a second wave of the insects in key agricultural areas.

The arrival of the locusts could be catastrophic in South Sudan, where war followed by drought and floods has already left six million people—60 percent of the population—facing severe hunger.

Agriculture Minister Onyoti Adigo Nyikiwec said the locusts had crossed the eastern border with Uganda on Monday.


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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Immerman on Tuesday February 25 2020, @02:23AM

    by Immerman (3985) on Tuesday February 25 2020, @02:23AM (#962159)

    The inefficiencies are actually *incredibly* low - as I recall you typically get something like 9 pounds of animal protein for every 10 pounds of plant matter. Even better, locusts eat the leaves, stems, etc. which people can't digest effectively if they even bother to harvest, so you actually get a lot more and better food than you would have harvesting the crop.

    I seem to remember hearing that "manna from heaven" may have actually originally referred to locusts - an incredible food source that would periodically sweep across drought-ravaged areas where people might otherwise starve.

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