MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Virulent wheat fungus spreading in Asian grain areas says FAO

The United Nations food agency has asked wheat-producing nations in Asia, including India and Pakistan to be on high alert following a report that a new virulent wheat fungus has moved to major wheat-growing areas in Iran.

The Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization-FAO said that about 80% of all wheat varieties planted in Asia and Africa are susceptible to wheat stem rust, a fungus capable of destroying entire crop fields. The FAO reports that wheat stem ruse, whose spores are carried by wind across continents, was previously found in East Africa and Yemen. But now it has moved to Iran, a major wheat producer, where its presence has been confirmed by laboratory tests in some localities in Broujerd and Hamedan in the country's west. The FAO said the detection of the wheat-rust fungus in Iran is extremely worrisome and asked major wheat-producing nations to Iran's east, including Afghanistan, India, Pakistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, to be on high alert. "The fungus is spreading rapidly and could seriously lower wheat production in countries at direct risk" said Shivaji Pandey, Director of FAO Plant Production and Protection Division. Affected countries and the international community have to bolster disease surveillance and ensure that the spread of the disease is checked in order to reduce the risk to countries that are already hit by high food prices, the U.N. agency said in Rome on Wednesday. Meanwhile, Iran has said that it will strengthen its research capabilities to tackle the new fungus and develop wheat varieties that are stem rust-resistant. The disease called Ug99 first surfaced in Uganda and subsequently spread to Kenya and Ethiopia. Both countries are experiencing serious crop yield losses due to a rust epidemic last year. Additionally in 2007, FAO confirmed that a more virulent strain was found in Yemen. It is now feared that the new threat could further push up global wheat prices by at least 10-15%. In the spot retail market, wheat prices have surged by 40% in last one year on global shortage. Global wheat production is estimated at 603 million tons in 2007, up 1.2% from 2006. In Asia, the output is estimated to rise by 1.7% to 928 million tons in 2007 compared with 912.6 million tons last year.