Director of Agriculture Production in the Ministry of Agriculture, Water and Land Reform, Mildred Kambinda, said locust eggs laid during Namibia’s years of drought is the reason why some regions are invaded by locusts. The four regions infested by locusts are the Kavango East and West, Zambezi and //Kharas. The locust eggs hatched when the environment became conducive, amongst others caused by the good rainfall received this year. Kambinda said this while giving an update on the African migratory red locust infestation at the government information centre on Tuesday. She said the ministry, the Office of the Prime Minister and other developmental partners are working hard to combat the negative impact of the outbreak. She added that over 8% of the ministry’s staff are trained in control mechanisms and so are some commercial farmers in the //Kharas Region. Chief Agricultural Scientific Officer in the Zambezi Region, Violet Simaata, said two types of locusts have been identified: the Brown African locust in //Kharas and Zambezi and the Red African locust in the two Kavango regions and Zambezi. “We are handling the situation by strengthening surveillance and monitoring and we have deployed spraying teams to all four regions,” she said. Simaata said 50 Namibian Defence Force members are being trained to join the spraying team in Zambezi. In the Kavango East Region, the locust outbreak is being experienced in the Mashare, Mukwe and Rundu Rural constituencies, while in the Kavango West Region they invaded the Kapako and Musese constituencies. Spraying teams have been deployed in all the affected constituencies.