Desert locust movements in Northwest Africa raise concern amid the spring breeding season
In the sun-scorched expanses of Northwest Africa, a winged menace stirs, threatening the fragile lifeline of crops and pastures. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) today sounded a clarion call, urging nations to sharpen vigilance and unleash early defences as desert locust groups and nascent swarms, born in the Sahel’s crucible, sweep into the southern Sahara. From late February through March 2025, these relentless invaders—adult groups and small swarms—have descended upon central Algeria, western Libya, and southern Tunisia, heralding a spring breeding season of alarming intensity, fueled by favourable ecological conditions.
Originating in the Sahel’s breeding grounds of northern Mali, Niger, Chad, and southern Algeria, where small groups mated from August to early March, the locusts have ridden winds and rainfall northward, infiltrating key regions like the Hoggar Mountains in Algeria and Fezzan in southwest Libya.
Wings of Ruin: FAO Urges Vigilance in Locust-Hit Sahara
The FAO, with measured urgency, has declared a state of caution across the Western Region of the desert locust’s domain, pressing for heightened monitoring. “Surveys and control operations are particularly urgent in locations where winter and early spring rains have created suitable breeding conditions,” warns Cyril Piou, FAO’s Locust Monitoring and Forecasting Officer, his voice a beacon in the gathering storm.
Since January, FAO forecasts have foretold this peril, predicting that hatching and band formation would commence this month, with the potential for small swarms to emerge by May and June, poised to ravage crops and pastureland if unchecked.
The desert locust, a migratory scourge of biblical dread, wields unmatched destructive power. A single swarm, sprawling from one to hundreds of square kilometres, can harbour up to 80 million adults in a mere square kilometre, devouring in a single day the sustenance of 35,000 people.
The stakes are dire, and the FAO’s directive is clear: intensive ground surveys must sweep across vulnerable terrains, from south of Morocco’s Atlas Mountains to the Sahara in Algeria, stretching to southern Tunisia and western Libya. These lands, kissed by sufficient rainfall, now cradle lush vegetation—an unwitting cradle for locust proliferation. Early detection and swift response are the bulwarks against a wider crisis, safeguarding the region’s precarious food security.
This is no mere pestilence but a test of human resolve. Piou and the FAO stand as sentinels, guiding nations to act before the locust bands coalesce into swarms that could darken the skies and strip the earth bare. The call echoes across Northwest Africa: monitor, control, protect. For in these delicate ecosystems, where every blade of grass sustains life, the battle against the locust is a battle for survival itself.
FAO, through its Desert Locust Information Service (DLIS) and Commission for Controlling the Desert Locust in the Western Region (CLCPRO), continues to provide technical guidance, real-time updates, and operational support to affected countries.
– global bihari bureau
