Hrach Berberyan, President of Armenia’s Agrarian-Rural Union, says that rodents are destroying the country’s wheat fields and that pesticides haven’t alleviated the growing threat. "Either the pesticides aren’t getting to the areas that need them or they arrive too late," stated Berberyan. He noted that rural municipalities and mayors have never worked effectively for local growers since these institutions are political and not production-based. Mr. Berberyan said that the rodent problem became worse this year given that rural growers left large tracts of land uncultivated. "It’s not that villagers don’t want to farm the land, but they don’t have the necessary resources to do so," Berberyan argued. The Union president said that his organization has drafted an emergency plan to tackle the problem and hopes that the government will lend its backing.