Overview

• Locusts of two species—Locusta migratoria and Anacridium aegyptium—continue to swarm across southern Ukraine, affecting both Kyiv- and Moscow-controlled regions.
• Over 6,000 hectares in Zaporizhzhia have been sprayed with pesticides, yet the swarms have already devastated 27 square kilometers of sunflower fields in Kherson and 200 hectares of maize in occupied Zaporizhzhia.
• Regional officials, including Zaporizhzhia’s vice chief Andriy Piatnitsky, emphasize that the massive insect invasion poses no direct threat to human health.
• Kyiv attributes the outbreak to the June 2023 breach of the Kakhovka dam by Russian forces, which dried formerly inundated land and created ideal locust breeding grounds.
• Environmentalists warn that continued war-driven damage to water infrastructure and fallow frontline fields could unleash a prolonged ecological domino effect.