by Julius Gale

JUBA, Jan. 23 (Xinhua) -- South Sudan and two United Nations agencies have teamed up to fight fall armyworm, a crop-eating pest that has invaded thousands of hectors of farmlands in the war-torn country.

South Sudan's Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO) and the World Food Program (WFP) said they will work together by enhancing monitoring and training of farmers and adapting integrated armyworm management practices across the country.

Minister of Agriculture and Food Security Onyoti Adigo said the government has partnered with the two UN agencies to develop a strategic action plan for the management of fall armyworm in South Sudan.

He said the plan will be supported by a funding of 3 million U.S. dollars from the Japanese government.

"We want to diversify our agriculture sector and put in place strong pest control measures in order to get the people of South Sudan from the current situation of food insecurity," Onyoti said in Juba.

"I urge our partners and experts to make intensive research about fall armyworm. The East African region also needs joint efforts to tackle the outbreak in the region," he added.

Serge Tissot, FAO country representative in South Sudan, said fall armyworm poses another threat of hunger to the people of South Sudan, adding that the FAO will work with the government and partners to roll out intervention mechanisms across the country.

"South Sudan is already facing a lot of problems regarding food security. Fall armyworm is just an additional threat. It is important to approach this threat with all the capacity," Tissot said. "We are here all together to fight fall armyworm in South Sudan and I'm sure it will succeed."

South Sudan declared an outbreak of the fall armyworm in June 2017, with the agriculture ministry saying last August that 166,000 hectares of farmland had been infested, 500 of which were destroyed completely.

Simon Cammelbeech, a WFP representative in South Sudan, said the fall armyworm infestation has spread to eight states of the country.

The world food agency said it is concerned that fall armyworm has spread to all parts of the equatorial region, an area considered to be the main food basket for South Sudan where farmers are already struggling to get enough to eat.

According to the FAO, the presence of the fall armyworm on the African continent was first reported in Sao Tome and Principe around January 2016, and has devastated farmlands in several countries in southern and eastern Africa.

The FAO said the fall armyworm can cause extensive crop losses of up to 73 percent depending on existing conditions and is difficult to control with a single type of pesticide, especially when it has reached an advanced larval stage.