"Dhaka - The UN's World Food Programme began distributing emergency food aid on Sunday to 120 000 people facing famine in south eastern Bangladesh, where an invasion of rats led to widespread crop destruction.
People from the affected areas in the Chittagong hill tracks were struggling to feed themselves and had been eating wild roots from the jungle ever since the area was overrun by millions of rats, the WFP said. The flowering of bamboo forests for the first time in 50 years in the affected areas, located along a 300-kilometre border stretch with India, led to the so-called "rat-flood".
The rodents multiplied by feeding on bamboo blossoms, rice stalks and vegetables. Villagers said that whatever they tried to grow was devoured within hours.
Plague every 50 to 60 years
The bamboo forests first began blossoming last year in the Lusai Hills in the neighbouring Indian state of Mizoram. Authorities declared it a disaster zone after rats went on to eat food stocks.
Locals said the plague happened once every 50 to 60 years, with the last such disaster in 1958.
It was feared the rats would infest the region for at least three more years, as they did in the late 1950s. " LINK
People from the affected areas in the Chittagong hill tracks were struggling to feed themselves and had been eating wild roots from the jungle ever since the area was overrun by millions of rats, the WFP said. The flowering of bamboo forests for the first time in 50 years in the affected areas, located along a 300-kilometre border stretch with India, led to the so-called "rat-flood".
The rodents multiplied by feeding on bamboo blossoms, rice stalks and vegetables. Villagers said that whatever they tried to grow was devoured within hours.
Plague every 50 to 60 years
The bamboo forests first began blossoming last year in the Lusai Hills in the neighbouring Indian state of Mizoram. Authorities declared it a disaster zone after rats went on to eat food stocks.
Locals said the plague happened once every 50 to 60 years, with the last such disaster in 1958.
It was feared the rats would infest the region for at least three more years, as they did in the late 1950s. " LINK
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