By DEBORAH SMITH, SCIENCE EDITOR NSW faces a dangerous bushfire season, with hot, dry spring weather and abundant fuel predicted to result in a higher than average risk of major fires breaking out across the state, scientists have warned. Large swathes of the country, including all of Victoria, also have a greater than normal chance […]
By Peter Fimrite, Chronicle Staff Writer The key spawning grounds for what was once the greatest run of salmon on the North Coast are close to being as dry as they have ever been, according to biologists and the U.S. Geological Survey. As California bakes under a third year of drought, the Scott and Shasta […]
NAIROBI, Kenya, September 14,2009 (ENS) – A multimillion dollar appeal to save the Mau Forests Complex, the most important source of water for human consumption in the Rift Valley and Western Kenya, was launched by the government of Kenya at a forum hosted by the United Nations Environment Programme last week. Continued destruction of these […]
NKAYA, 11 September 2009 (IRIN) – Degradation of the environment is reaching alarming levels in Nkaya in southern Malawi, where people have to walk ever greater distances to collect firewood and water. Mayi Chambo, a village head in Nkaya, blamed charcoal makers for the deforestation. This is her story. “In the 1980s we had lush […]
Addis Ababa (AFP) Sept 10, 2009 – The European Union granted Ethiopia 10 million euros (14.5 million dollars) to help feed more than six million people in need of emergency aid due to drought, the bloc said Thursday. “Ethiopia faces growing humanitarian challenges which are largely due to climate change,” EU’s country representative Dino Sinigallia […]
Basra, Iraq (AFP) Sept 9, 2009 – Iraqis living alongside the ancient Shatt al-Arab waterway, the site local legend says of the Garden of Eden, face an environmental catastrophe because of massive dams built by neighbouring Iran. A vibrant fresh water lifeline teeming with fish has become a salty, polluted channel which is driving people […]
Lucknow, India (AFP) Sept 9, 2009 – Drought-hit farmers in northern India are resorting to selling their wives to repay debts to local loan sharks, activists say, as one of the weakest monsoons in years takes its toll. Poverty, poor administration and a lack of education means farmers in the rugged Bundelkhand region are taking […]
Figure 3.6. Graph of the acreage of piñon pine (Pinus edulis) and ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa) dieback from 1997–2004 in the Four Corners States of Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, and Utah. Based upon annual aerial forest insect and disease activity inventories by the U.S. Forest Service. Thresholds of Climate Change in Ecosystems [pdf], U.S. […]
Guatemala City (AFP) Sept 9, 2009 – Guatemala’s President Alvaro Colom has declared a “public calamity” from drought and famine that have claimed more than 460 lives since the start of the year. “I have decided to declare a state of public calamity throughout the country,” Colom declared in a nationally-broadcast address Tuesday. “This will […]
Crops are wilting in the countryside, and the capital’s water shortage has turned dire as Mexico grapples with its worst drought in more than half a century. By Ken Ellingwood, Reporting from Mexico City – In the parched Mexican countryside, the corn is wilting, the wheat stunted. And here in this vast and thirsty capital, […]
