Heavy equipment sits submerged in flood waters in an industrial area of Brisbane, Australia, on January 13, 2011. Flood water in Australia's third-biggest city peaked below feared catastrophic levels on Thursday but Brisbane and other devastated regions face years of rebuilding and even the threat of fresh floods in the weeks ahead. REUTERS / Tim Wimborne

By Jon Stibbs
2 March 2011 BOGOTA (AlertNet) – Widespread flooding in Bolivia, which prompted the government to declare a national emergency last week, shows the vulnerability of one of South America’s poorest countries to changing weather patterns linked to climate change. Landlocked Bolivia, which runs from the rugged Andes to the Amazon jungle, faces a variety of climate change-related pressures, from disappearing glaciers to worsening droughts and more intense and unpredictable rainfall. Combined with rising urban demand for water, the problems suggest a long-term water crisis ahead for the country, analysts say. The latest disaster has killed at least 50 people and left thousands homeless in Bolivia after weeks of heavy rain triggered flooding and mudslides, with 400 houses destroyed in the capital La Paz alone in a mudslide. In Cochabamba, southeast of La Paz, schools and stadiums were sheltering hundreds of families whose homes were destroyed. In lowland Santa Cruz department, Bolivia’s major grain growing region, floods damaged soy, corn and wheat crops. Rivers burst their banks and major roads were unusable.  … Changing ocean temperatures and increased evaporation linked to climate change may be increasing the frequency and intensity of La Niña and El Niño events, some scientists believe. … Roger Quiroga, emergency coordinator for Oxfam GB in Bolivia, described Beni as one of the “largest lakes in the world” during the annual rainy season, when 150,000 sq kms is covered, an area equivalent to the size of Ecuador or Nicaragua. … While many regions of Bolivia are flooding, others are getting less rainfall than normal. Edwin Torrez Soria, climate change investigator for Agua Sustentable (Sustainable Water), a non-governmental organisation, said in parts of the country the rainy season has been shortening and rains increasing in intensity. Temperatures during rainy season have been rising, boosting evaporation. Perhaps the most worrying threat to the country’s water supplies, however, has been glacier retreat. Chacaltaya, which at 5,300 m was once the world’s highest ski run, is now a rocky, icy slope with a redundant lift. Quoting the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change, Torrez said Bolivia’s glaciers were in a “critical” state. Dirk Hoffman, executive director of Bolivian Mountain Institute, painted a darker picture: “There is nothing to be done about the Bolivian glaciers. They are doomed.” …

Flooded Bolivia faces long-term water woes