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Posts Tagged ‘drought’

Food Crisis as Drought and Cold Hit Mexico

January 31, 2012 Comments off

nytimes.com

Henry Romero/Reuters

MEXICO CITY — A drought that a government official called the most severe Mexico had ever faced has left two million people without access to water and, coupled with a cold snap, has devastated cropland in nearly half of the country.

Reports that the Tarahumara were killing themselves in despair over starvation, later proven false, spurred residents of Mexico City to collect food and clothing donations.

The government in the past week has authorized $2.63 billion in aid, including potable water, food and temporary jobs for the most affected areas, rural communities in 19 of Mexico’s 31 states. But officials warned that no serious relief was expected for at least another five months, when the rainy season typically begins in earnest.

While the authorities say they expect the situation to worsen, one of the five worst-affected states, Zacatecas, got a reprieve on Sunday. Heriberto Félix Guerra, head of the Ministry of Social Development,  saw the Read more…

Categories: Droughts, Food Crisis Tags: , , ,

Heat Warnings Issues in 17 States

July 19, 2011 Comments off
christianpost

The majority of the U.S. is in for another sweat dripping next few days as this weekend’s heat wave lingers into the work week.

The heat index is as high as 126 degrees in portions of the upper Midwest. Heat warnings, watches, and advisories remain in effect for most of central U.S. Seventeen states have issued heat warnings for this week and 36 states are expected to see 90 degrees or above today.

The Midlands are expected to see heat index values between 110-115 between Thursday through Sunday of this week. Air temperatures will likely break records and by Wednesday the midlands are expected to be at or around the century high mark.

According to Accuweather, a high pressure system over the Great Plains is the cause for sizzling temperatures from Texas through the Midwest. The plains and Mississippi Valley are likely to feel the worst of the Read more…

Categories: United States, Weather Tags: , , ,

Melting glaciers store up trouble

July 14, 2011 Comments off

swissinfo

A Greenpeace activist walks a tightrope over a glacier lake.

Image Caption: A Greenpeace activist walks a tightrope over a glacier lake. (Keystone)

by Julia Slater, swissinfo.ch

As the alpine glaciers shrink they will affect the flow of Europe’s biggest rivers, impacting areas of the economy ranging from shipping to power generation.

Glaciologist Matthias Huss of Fribourg University has discovered that right down to the sea, the Danube, Rhine, Rhone and Po contain a larger proportion of water from glaciers than previously thought.

For example, more than a quarter of the water that flows from the Rhone into the Mediterranean in August has its origin in alpine glaciers. At its mouth in the Netherlands seven percent of the water in the Rhine is Read more…

Categories: Earth changes, Europe, world Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

China raises flood alert to top level, 555,000 evacuated

June 17, 2011 Comments off

reuters

BEIJING (Reuters) – China has mobilized troops to help with flood relief and raised its disaster alert to the highest level after days of downpours forced the evacuation of more than half a million people in central and southern provinces.

More than 555,000 people had been evacuated in seven provinces and a municipality after rains in recently drought-stricken areas caused floods and mudslides in the Yangtze River basin, the official China Daily said.

State media said that as of Thursday evening, floods caused by the most recent four days of rain had Read more…

Categories: Flood Tags: , , , , ,

Drought continues to tighten its grip on Georgia

June 1, 2011 Comments off

accessnorthga

UNDATED – The drought continues to push deeper into north Georgia while making it difficult for south Georgia farmers to plant two key crops.

A new report shows roughly 77 percent of the state’s cotton crop and 80 percent of the peanut crop have been planted.

The driest conditions in the state continue to be two pockets in southwest and southeast Georgia.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Drought Monitor says the drought has now pushed as far north as southern Habersham County, south Dawson and south Forsyth, extending westward to the Alabama line near Carrollton and LaGrange. Gainesville and all of Hall County are now considered in a drought. Conditions in all of these areas are considered “abnormally” dry.

A swath of counties just Read more…

Categories: Droughts, Georgia Tags: , , ,

Drought worsens fears of inflation

May 31, 2011 Comments off

peopledaily.com

A rare drought that has wreaked havoc in central and southern China is expected to send grain prices soaring as experts predict the worst disaster of its kind in 50 years could offset the government’s efforts to curb inflation and threaten its annual CPI target of 4 percent.

Five provinces in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River – Hubei, Hunan, Jiangxi, Anhui and Jiangsu, a major grain-producing region – have suffered the most serious drought in decades.

The drought had affected 34.8 million people, over one million livestock, and 3.7 million hectares of farmland as of Friday, causing direct economic losses of 14.9 billion yuan ($2.3 billion), the Ministry of Civil Affairs said.

As farmers struggled to find new water sources for their crops, many fishing boats found themselves grounded as the river and lakes shrank, and residents in the region found the prices of vegetables, rice and aquatic products rising.

“Prices of some fruit and vegetables have increased to 6 yuan per kilogram on Tuesday from 3.6 yuan last week,” Jin Zhengsheng, 50, a resident of Kunshan, Jiangsu Province, told the Global Times.

Huang Xianyin, 41, a villager from Xinjian county, Jiangxi Province, also noticed the hikes.

“It’s not only vegetables. Read more…

Categories: Uncategorized Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

China drought ignites global grain supply concerns

May 26, 2011 Comments off

reuters

A prolonged drought in China could hit grains output in key growing regions, further squeezing global supplies and putting upward pressure on prices, but plentiful domestic wheat stocks will act as a cushion and keep import volumes low.

Analysts are closely watching the weather in China, warning any further supply shocks in the grain markets would fuel a further rally in U.S. corn and wheat futures, already stoked by harsh crop weather in the United States and Europe.

“Parts of China have been too dry and if we did see crop failures in that part of the world they are going to look to the global market for supplies,” said Luke Mathews, a commodity strategist with Commonwealth Bank of Australia in Sydney.

“They are going to be looking to North America and Europe and there is significant amount of concern whether those particular countries will be able to satisfy those needs.”

Chicago Board of Trade corn has climbed 80 percent since the start of May last year, while wheat has risen around 50 percent. Last week alone corn and wheat jumped more than 10 percent on expectations of a global squeeze in supplies.

CROP CONCERNS & TIGHT GLOBAL SUPPLIES

Timely corn seeding is crucial for optimal yields needed to replenish U.S. supplies that are projected at the lowest level in 15 years amid strong demand from livestock feeders, ethanol makers and exporters.

About 80 percent of the U.S. corn crop has been planted, according to the U.S. Agriculture Department, but showers this week are expected to bring the final corn seedings to Read more…

Categories: China, Droughts, world Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Iran’s largest lake turning to salt

May 25, 2011 1 comment

yahoo

AP/Vahid Salemi

An Iranian family walks on the solidified salts of Oroumieh Lake. More photos »

OROUMIEH LAKE, Iran – From a hillside, Kamal Saadat looked forlornly at hundreds of potential customers, knowing he could not take them for trips in his boat to enjoy a spring weekend on picturesque Oroumieh Lake, the third largest saltwater lake on earth.

“Look, the boat is stuck… It cannot move anymore,” said Saadat, gesturing to where it lay encased by solidifying salt and lamenting that he could not understand why the lake was fading away.

The long popular lake, home to migrating flamingos, pelicans and gulls, has shrunken by 60 percent and could disappear entirely in just a few years, experts say — drained by drought, misguided Read more…

Categories: Iran Tags: , , , , , , , ,

China’s Yangtze river closed to ships by severe drought

May 13, 2011 Comments off

telegraph

The Yangtze river, the longest waterway in Asia and China’s most important shipping route, has been closed by the worst drought in 50 years that has left cargo ships stranded and 400,000 people without drinking water.

China's Yangtze river closed to ships by severe drought

Chinese fishing boats berth on the dried river banks as the annual dry winter season caused the water level along the Yangtze river to be so low Photo: AFP

Water-levels have sunk as low as 10ft in the main thoroughfare of the 3,900-mile long river that stretches from the glaciers of the Tibetan plateau to the coastal city of Shanghai.

The Yangtze river basin is home to one-third of China’s population and is responsible for 40 per cent of the country’s economic growth.

Emergency teams have been sent to the river’s middle reaches around Wuhan in the central province of Hubei, to rescue two ships Read more…

Categories: China, Droughts Tags: , , ,

Grains Wilt in Dry Europe as England Posts Its Hottest April in 352 Years

May 4, 2011 Comments off

bloomberg

Europe Grains Wilt as England Has Hottest April in 352 Years

Dry, warm weather in Europe may reduce global wheat stockpiles already expected to fall 7.6 percent in the year that ends on May 31, the biggest decline since 2007. Photographer: Simon Dawson/Bloomberg

Dry weather in France and Germany and England’s hottest April in at least 352 years are threatening crops across the European Union, producer of a fifth of the world’s wheat.

About 20 percent of average rain fell in the U.K. in April after a dry March, further reducing soil moisture, the Home- Grown Cereals Authority, an industry group, said in an e-mailed report. European wheat and rapeseed crops are “in jeopardy” after an “incredibly dry” April, according to agricultural weather forecaster Martell Crop Projections.

Dry, warm weather in Europe may reduce global wheat stockpiles already expected to fall 7.6 percent in the year that ends on May 31, the biggest decline since 2007. Food prices reached a record in February, driving 44 million people into poverty, and wheat consumption may rise to an all-time high this year. The world “cannot afford” for Europe’s crop to be diminished, Abdolreza Abbassian, a senior economist at the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, said last month.

“The world needs a bumper crop in all grains from the U.S. and from Europe and from Canada or we are in trouble,” Dennis Gartman, an economist and author of The Gartman Letter, said today by e-mail. “The winter wheat crop here is in trouble, and the spring wheat crop in the Dakotas and the Canadian prairies may be very badly delayed and therefore in Read more…

Categories: Droughts, Europe Tags: , , , , , , , , ,