West Bank farms ravaged by pests

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Tang Liung Poh

Tang Liung Poh

SIBU: Small scale farmer Tang Liung Poh, 49, claims that farmers at the West Bank have lost 60 per cent of their crop to pests.

He said it was a common problem for farmers during hot and dry season, but the situation this year was unusually bad.

“I have to stop working on half of my crops,” he told The Borneo Post and See Hua Daily News in an interview yesterday.

He said the biggest pest problem is the Phyllotera vittata (flea beetle) and Plutella Xylostella (diamondback moth).

Tang, who rents a 10-acre farm to plant his crops, said the pest problems were now beyond control.

“On average, I can say farmers at the West Bank lost about RM2,000 of income for every one-acre farm,” he estimated.

Tang, who has been a farmer since a little boy, said his parents, had never encountered such problem in their lives.

He believed the climate change had worsen the pest problems.

“I can recall it started in the 1980s, but it was not that bad. Now, it is really bad,” he said.

For now, Tang said he was looking for some land to enable him to plant new crops.

“New land would not have pest problems, so, I am looking for someone who wants to rent his land to me,” he said.