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Third district in Astrakhan Region clamps down state of emergency over locust invasion

One more district in the Astrakhan Region – Ikryaninsky – imposed the state of emergency in connection with the locust invasion

Photo ITAR-TASS

Photo ITAR-TASS

VOLGOGRAD, May 26 (Itar-Tass) — One more district in the Astrakhan Region – Ikryaninsky – imposed the state of emergency in connection with the locust invasion, Itar-Tass learnt on Saturday at the Southern Regional Centre of the Russian Ministry for Emergencies.

The Limansky district announced the state of emergency on May 10, and Kamyzyaksky on May 24.

Pests are spread over an area of 2,800 hectares in the Ikryansky district, over an area of 10.500 ha in Kamyzyaksky and over 39,000 hectares in the Limansky district. The growth of larvae of locust pests is attributed to weather conditions: higher air temperatures up to 32 degrees Celsius, insignificant quantities of precipitations and the small volume of spring floods, the ministry explained.

Locust will be air-borne early in June. If they are not destroyed by this time, there will be a real threat to agricultural crops over large areas. Special machinery and aviation, spraying crop fields with toxic chemicals are involved in fighting pests.

Locust is especially dangerous in irrigation land zones. These insects destroy buckwheat, maize, sunflower, legumes, watermelons, potatoes and grain. One of the most wide-spread types of locust is Italian prus. It is widely met in the middle and lower reaches of the Volga River, in the south of the European part, in Western Siberia, the Caucasus, Central Asia and Kazakhstan.

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