An estimated 20 million people in southern Africa face UN calls it ‘severe hunger’ One of the worst droughts in more than four decades has withered crops, decimated livestock and sent prices for corn, the region’s main crop, soaring after years of rising food prices due to the pandemic and war.
Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe A national emergency has been declared for all.
Although scientists said Thursday that the current drought is caused more by the natural weather cycle than El Niño, a warming climate is expected to bring pain to a region likely to be severely affected by climate change. global warming.
The impact is compounded because over the past few years the region has suffered from hurricanes, unusually heavy rains and an expanding cholera epidemic.
Need “urgent help”
Rainfall this year started late and was below average. In February, when crops need rain most, parts of Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi, Angola, Mozambique and Botswana received as little as one-fifth of normal rainfall.
This is devastating for these largely agricultural countries, where farmers are completely dependent on rainfall.
In the Chikwawa region of southern Malawi, some residents waded into a crocodile-infested river to collect a wild tuber called nyika to satisfy their hunger. “My area needs urgent help,” said a local leader who calls himself Chief Chimombo.
Elsewhere, cattle seeking water walked into fields that were still muddy after last year’s heavy rains and got stuck, said Chikondi Chabvuta, a rescue worker with the international rescue group CARE in Malawi. Thousands of cattle have died in the area, according to the group.
The first few months of each year, before the harvest begins in late April and May, is usually the lean season.This year, due to the expected harvest significantly reduced, the off-season may last longer. “The food security situation is very bad and is expected to get worse,” Ms. Chabuvuta said.
FAO pointed out that in addition to low yields, food prices are unusually high due to the war in Ukraine, one of the world’s largest food exporters, and the weak currency of several countries in southern Africa, which makes imported food expensive. Food, fuel and fertilizers.
why does this happen
according to Analysis released Thursday World Weather Attribution, an international alliance of scientists focused on rapidly assessing extreme weather events, believes the driving force behind the current drought is El Niño, a natural weather phenomenon that warms parts of the Pacific every few years , and change the local weather. Different parts of the world have different ways. In southern Africa, El Niño tends to bring below-average rainfall.
The study concluded that El Niño doubled the likelihood of drought. This weather pattern is weakening now but is expected to return soon.
Droughts may also be exacerbated by deforestation, which disrupts local rainfall patterns and leads to soil degradation, the study concluded.
Droughts are notoriously difficult to attribute to global warming. This is particularly true in regions such as southern Africa, in part because the region does not have a dense network of weather stations to provide detailed historical data.
Scientists are unsure whether climate change played a role in this particular drought. However, there is little uncertainty about the long-term effects of climate change in this part of the world.
Average temperatures rise in southern Africa Temperature has increased by 1.04 to 1.8 degrees Celsius in the past 50 yearsAccording to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the number of hot days has increased. This makes a dry year even worse. Plants and animals are thirstier. Water evaporates. The soil dries out.Scientific models suggest southern Africa Overall becomes drier.
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change calls southern Africa climate change “Hot spots In terms of extreme heat and dryness. “
cost of adaptation
For millions of people trying to cope with drought, it doesn’t matter whether climate change or other causes are causing the skies to become dry.
What matters is whether these communities can adapt quickly enough to weather shocks.
“It is important to improve drought resilience, especially in these parts of the continent,” said Joyce Kimtey, one of the study’s authors and a researcher at the Grantham Institute at the Center for Climate and Environment at Imperial College London.
Existing solutions require money to implement: early warning systems to tell people what to expect, insurance and other social safety nets, programs to help them prepare, and diversifying the crops farmers grow. Corn is highly susceptible to high temperatures and erratic rainfall.
golden matunga Contributed reporting.
