Topic: A study of the past and future effects of climate change on the population dynamics of the desert locust
Dates: 15 October 2021 – 31 January 2025
CBGP managers: C. Meynard et C. Piou
University: L’Institut Agro Dijon & Université de Bourgogne-Franche-Comté
In response to high population density, the Desert Locust, Schistocerca gregaria, becomes gregarious and forms swarms that can cause significant damage to crops and pastures, threatening food security for populations from West Africa to India. As the species relies on favourable weather conditions to reproduce, climate change could have significant impacts. The main objective of this thesis will be to synthesise ecological knowledge of the desert locust into a mechanistic distribution model in order to highlight the relationships between climatic conditions and gregarious behaviour. Using models that combine historical data with past climate variables, a first objective of the thesis is to assess how these factors, as they change under climate change, may have altered the population dynamics of the desert locust in the past. A second objective is to explore climate change scenarios using a locust population dynamics simulator to assess how these populations might respond to climate change in the future.
Keywords: pests, climate change, modelling, risk prevention.
