NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH

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NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH
Project acronym:CNH
Project start:2013
Project end:2019

Linking Livestock Markets and Grazing Practices with the Nutritional Ecology of Grasses and Locusts Under Alternative Property Rights Regimes

Description

This project integrated novel fundamental research from multiple disciplines across four different countries —Australia, China, Senegal, and the US—to improve our ability to manage social-ecological systems. We investigated physiological, ecological, and nutritional mechanisms responsible for locust outbreaks and migration. This is one of the first projects to apply both highly-controlled lab and field-based techniques to connect physiological mechanisms to agricultural practices and livelihoods.

Research questions

  • How do insect-nutrient relations and livestock grazing strategies interact to affect food prices, food security, and rangeland degradation?
  • How do property rights regimes affect the adaptive capacity of societies to respond to the linkages between overgrazing and locust outbreaks?

Key findings

A new paradigm for plant-insect interaction research: many locust species are actually harmed by excessive nitrogen. Farmers may be able to keep locust populations in check through soil management practices that increase nitrogen. Government policy intervention may provide herders with less assurance of land rights; unwittingly incentivizing overstocking and reduced nitrogen levels. Farmers and herders face many tradeoffs between stocking rates, weather events, and financial decisions.

Major outcomes

  • Increased understanding of how livestock grazing influences locust outbreaks through changes in plant nutrition.

Enhanced knowledge of how locust outbreaks impact livelihoods, livestock markets, and grazing decisions by developing models, *theoretical predictions, and enterprise budgets.

  • Generated livestock enterprise budgets to calculate profit per animal unit sold and determined economic shocks to the meat sector due to locust outbreaks.

Future pathways

Research on this project is developing new insights into the interaction between environmental risks and property rights. We are learning about novel feedbacks between livestock production, policy mechanisms, and land tenure institutions. This fundamental research is also being applied in the USAID OFDA project.

Associated publications

Title Year published Projects Doi
A global review on locusts (Orthoptera: Acrididae) and their interactions with livestock grazing practices. 2019 NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH https://doi.org/10.3389/fevo.2019.00263
Corrigendum: A global review on locusts (Orthoptera: Acrididae) and their interactions with livestock grazing practices 2023 NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH https://doi.org/10.3389/fevo.2019.00263
Heavy livestock grazing promotes locust outbreaks by lowering plant nitrogen content 2012 NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1214433
Landscape level patterns of grasshopper communities in Inner Mongolia: interactive effects of livestock grazing and precipitation gradient 2015 NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-015-0247-8
Linking land use and the nutritional ecology of herbivores: A case study with the Senegalese locust 2020 NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2435.13466
Living with locusts: connecting soil nitrogen, locust outbreaks, livelihoods, and livestock markets 2015 NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH https://doi.org/10.1093/biosci/biv048
Mismatched diets: defining the nutritional landscape of grasshopper communities in a variable environment 2021 FFAR New Innovator in Food and Agriculture Research Award, NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.3409
Nitrogen fertilizer decreases survival and reproduction of female locusts by increasing plant protein to carbohydrate ratio 2020 NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2656.13288
Nutritional imbalance suppresses migratory phenotypes of the Mongolian locust (Oedaleus asiaticus) 2017 NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.161039
Physiological status is a stronger predictor of nutrient selection than ambient plant nutrient content for a wild herbivore 2021 NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cris.2020.100004
Soil-targeted interventions could alleviate locust and grasshopper pest pressure in West Africa 2019 NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.01.313
Woody vegetation remnants within pastures influence locust distribution: Testing bottom-up and top-down control 2020 NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts CNH https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agee.2020.106931


Associated resources

English short title Year published Category Author Species purview Geographic purview Language
NSF Coupled Natural Human Systems Living with Locusts project summary 2021 Technical report Australian Plague Locust Commission, Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of Zoology, New South Wales Department of Primary Industries, Grassland Research Institute, Inner Mongolia Agriculture University, Lanzhou University, New South Wales Local Land Services, Peace Corps Senegal, Directorate of Plant Protection, Cheikh Anta Diop University of Dakar, Chinese Academy of Sciences, University of Sydney Mongolian locust (Oedaleus decorus), Senegalese grasshopper (Oedaleus senegalensis), Australian plague locust (Chortoicetes terminifera) Senegal, Australia, China, United States of America English, Spanish, French

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