Brava: Farmers concerned about monkey invasions of agricultural plots

At a meeting that took place this afternoon between local authorities and farmers to find answers to the plague, those affected said that they are practically abandoning their land due to the monkey invasion.

In statements to the media, the farmers' spokesman, António Da Lomba, said that this situation is very "worrying", given that these animals are completely damaging the sugar cane and banana plantations.

According to the farmer, the monkeys are pests that should not be exterminated, but controlled, but he admits that the time has come when the authorities need to be more attentive and come up with solutions to the problem.

"There used to be farmers who planted vegetables, fruit and so on, but now due to the huge number of these animals they aren't doing it and the solution is to buy the produce," he said.

For his part, the director of the Biflores Association, Dheeraj Jayant, pointed out that the problem of invasive species, both flora and fauna, especially scrub hens and monkeys, is very worrying for farmers.

In this regard, the director said that there are a number of short and medium-term solutions that should be implemented, but that the dynamics of the monkey population should be understood and then a management plan should be drawn up, since "extermination is not the solution".

"These animals also have a right to live and are part of Cape Verde's history. What we have to do is control their populations, and for that we have several solutions. One is biological control, since these animals don't like certain plants such as pepper and ginger," he said.

As he suggested, these measures could be tested by planting these species in areas where monkeys attack to see if it works or not.

There are also long-term measures, which, according to him, would be capture and stabilization, but this strategy would require other partnerships.

Inforpress/End