In the Marshall Islands, where the Pacific Ocean's vibrant turquoise waters meet scattered atolls, the coconut palm stands majestically as both a vital emblem of sustenance and a profound cultural symbol. Known affectionately as "the tree of life," the coconut palm is deeply integrated into the Marshallese way of life, inspiring legends and serving a variety of practical purposes.

Two parasitoids introduced in mealybug (Rastrococcus invadens) in Burundi, Rwanda, and Uganda have freed an estimated 250 000 mango trees from this pest and supported the livelihoods of many farmers in the region. These beneficial insects were introduced to control the mango mealybug population by laying their eggs inside them, ultimately killing the pest and preventing further infestations.

As part of its ongoing efforts to maintain the preparedness to fight the desert locust, especially in invasion countries, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations conducted a crucial refresher training for locust officers from frontline counties as well as crop protection officers and equipped them with principles of desert locust survey and reporting.

Within the framework of the FAO-Türkiye Partnership Programme on Food and Agriculture (FTPP II), practical training was given to farmers on recognition and integrated management of wheat rust diseases at the Ikizce Research and Production Farm of the Field Crops Central Research Institute Directorate in Gölbaşı, Ankara.

The FAO’s Locust Pesticide Management System is being implemented in Ethiopia where it is used in the organization and recording data of desert locust pesticide control products and equipment in Kaliti store. Using the application, the Locust-PMS focal officers can register pesticide products for locust control, track useable and obsolete pesticides and empty containers, and monitor disposal of obsolete pesticides and associated waste, among other tasks.

The FAO-developed SusaHamra system has been launched in Jordan as its official national red palm weevil monitoring application, becoming the second country after Tunisia which adopted the system for monitoring and surveying the pest in the affected areas. The system is powered by PlantVillage.

When the desert locust upsurge of 2019–2022 occurred in Kenya, Esbon Agira, was deployed as a base manager in Marsabit County, north of the country. His work involved surveying desert locusts and provided information to the locust control operation teams. “Before the desert locust invasion, we were not prepared as a country. The last time Kenya faced the locust invasion of that magnitude was 70 years ago. There were thus no dedicated experts in desert locust management, and we lacked appropriate equipment and adequate pesticides to conduct control operations,” says Esbon.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations is reviewing its integrated biosecurity index tool essential in refining the measurement of biosecurity system status and progress at both national and sub-national levels, ensuring effectiveness, efficiency, and sustainability. At the national level, the index is envisioned as a planning tool, facilitating comprehensive assessments across ministries to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. This comprehensive tool encompasses five critical sectors: aquatic and terrestrial animal health, plant health, food safety, and forestry/invasive species management. 

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations has called for sustained locust management in Caucasus and Central Asia (CCA), based on long-term regional cooperation, monitoring and early warning systems, as well as advanced and safer control techniques, in particular biopesticides. The call was made at the side-event of the 34th session of the FAO Regional Conference for Europe (ERC34).

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations constructed five (5) Desert Locust centres in Yemen's key breeding areas. The initiative is part of the ongoing efforts to control & manage the pest in the Near East region. The Seiyun centre has been handed over to local authorities in Seiyun, in Hadramout governorate in Yemen. The country is one of the most significant Desert Locust breeding reservoirs in the region and the establishment of these Centres will mitigate pest outbreaks in the region and beyond.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, in collaboration with Georgia State University, is developing a novel training approach using Virtual Reality (VR) to teach teams about locust surveys and controls during breeding and invasion. The platform will create an immersive environment where locust officers and trainees will get to interact with locusts in a virtual classroom.

The new equipment were transferred to Kakheti region and tested under field conditions. This is part of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)'s ongoing programme on locust management in the Caucasus and Central Asia implemented with USAID financial assistance. The equipment include four vehicles, entomological kits, binoculars, GPS, tablets, and computers, among others. 

The Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), QU Dongyu, visited Mauritania's National Centre for Desert Locust Control today as part of a two-day visit to the northwestern African country. The Director-General was accompanied by Mauritania's Minister of Agriculture, His Excellency Umm Ould Bibateh, who underscored the importance of the visit in opening up promising horizons in the longstanding cooperation between Mauritania and FAO.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations has called for ‘’robust coordination’’ between countries and regions in efforts to prevent and combat the scourge of desert locusts. “Desert locust – as migratory pest – cannot be controlled by one single country or one single entity,” FAO Deputy Director-General Beth Bechdol told participants at a high-level webinar today.

Experts at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) have called on countries to invest in prevention measures against the Banana Fusarium Wilt caused by Tropical Race 4 (TR4) as it is key to control and delay the spread of the disease into new areas.  

Lack of appropriate locust monitoring and preparedness has been identified as major constraints that affect desert locust management. Other challenges include inaccessibility of some regions by vehicles or field officers due to lack of roads, difficult terrains, and insecurity.

Banana cultivation in Tanzania is being threatened by the presence of the banana bunchy top disease (BBTD) first detected in 2020 in Kigoma region. The disease is widespread in susceptible cultivars in eleven major banana-growing regions: Arusha, Dar es Salaam, Dodoma, Geita, Katavi, Kigoma, Kilimanjaro, Mbeya, Morogoro, Mwanza, and Pwani.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) conducted intensive training in desert locust survey and reporting for locust officers from Sudan, Uganda, and Ethiopia. This training was a follow up of a regional Training of Trainers course on desert locust survey and reporting techniques held last year.

 

Modern technology has much to offer for effective desert locust monitoring and control. This includes surveillance drones and their accompanying infrastructure technology, such as the system for data collection in the field and RAMSES (Reconnaissance And Management System of the Environment of Schistocerca), which is a custom software application comprising a database and a Geographic Information System (GIS) that stores the georeferenced results of survey and control operations.

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) delivered a module on locust morphology and taxonomy to students of the master’s in Acridology at the Institut Agronomique et Vétérinaire Hassan II (IAV) in Agadir, Morocco.

The course aimed to reinforce the knowledge of the first-year master’s students on the morphological features of insects, with a focus on acridids (locusts and grasshoppers) so that they can identify them at different stages of their development. The two-year master's programme will equip the field technicians with skills to implement sustainable preventive measures against locusts.