Rodent outbrakes in Sub-Saharan Africa

Abstract

The impacts of rodents in both developing and developed countries are legendary. Myths and dogma about rodents and their outbreaks abound. They are imbedded in the culture and language of many societies. In many instances, it is the acceptance of these outbreaks by society that is our greatest challenge as crop protection special- ists or conservation biologists. The reason these episodic outbreaks become etched in the socio-cultural psyche from the sparsely populated uplands of Laos to the considerably more affl uent agricultural lands of Europe is that the impacts are often staggering—economically, socially, and even politically. There becomes a degree of acceptance of these impacts—rural people are born with rodents and will die with them. Their presence and impacts become a part of life; they become accepted and farmers become fatalistic about the losses they incur. Indeed, farmers in some areas of the Philippines say they “plant two rows of rice for rats, one for the birds, and seven for my family.” This need not be the case given the progress of our knowledge on the factors that cause population outbreaks of rodents. Indeed, it is our responsibility as scientists to document and make this knowledge widely available, particularly with more than 1 billion people suffering chronic hunger and rodent pests contributing signifi cantly to this burden (see Singleton 2003, Meerburg et al 2009). Moreover, in Asia, the 640 million people suffering from chronic hunger (FAO 2009) mainly rely on agriculture for their subsistence. The impetus for this collation of contributions from Asia, Africa, Oceania (Aus- tralia and New Zealand), Europe, and North America was an international conference on “Impacts of Rodent Outbreaks on Food Security in Asia” held following an increase in reports during 2007-09 of population outbreaks of rodents in the rice-cropping systems of Asia. In Asia and Africa, there are few widely accessible publications on these outbreaks. Most appear in the gray literature as brief reports in the annals of provincial or state departments of agriculture. They are doomed to gather dust and be lost to future generations. If this happens, then the lessons from previous outbreaks are not learned and therefore the infl uence of myth and dogma often outweighs evidence- based scientifi c knowledge developed from our successes and failures of management Rodent outbreaks: an age-old issue with a modern appraisal 1actions undertaken during previous outbreaks. One message, among many, that we hope to convey to readers is that we have made strong advances in our understand- ing of the factors that lead to rodent outbreaks (see also Singleton et al 2010). And, with such knowledge, local people and offi cials should be better placed to reduce the potentially devastating impacts associated with “fl oods” of rodents in the agricultural, periurban, and natural landscapes