Russia's prime minister, Sergei Stepashin, said that the explosion of a Russian rocket over Kazakhstan on July 5th, which set off a political quarrel between the two countries, was a minor problem compared with the locust invasion.

ECONOMIST: Invasion of the locusts

"It's a 198-year-old honey locust, " Ms. Jacks reported.

WSJ: Hudson River Schooling

Officially known as the West Indian Locust, the stinking toe tree produces a seed pod that looks like a big, brown toe and also smells like one when the hard outer shell is cracked open.

BBC: Search the

But few of them are as short-term as the locust-critics suggest: typically, they invest in a firm for around five or six years.

ECONOMIST: American investors fight each other over Celanese

The Locust Control Centre in Madagascar had treated 30, 000 hectares of farmland since last October, but a cyclone in February made the situation worse, the FAO said.

BBC: Madagascar hit by 'severe' plague of locusts