Post by davidm on Jul 19, 2012 13:53:03 GMT 9.5
When the United States has severe droughts through much of the country that means something worldwide.
www.counterpunch.org/2012/07/18/climate-and-the-food-crisis/
Climate change provides an important but commonly unreported background for recently failed states like Syria.
www.counterpunch.org/2012/07/18/climate-and-the-food-crisis/
The United States is “the breadbasket of the world,” and the largest exporter of corn, soybeans, and wheat, accounting for one in every three tonnes of staple grains that feed the world. Over the past month, futures prices for corn and wheat are up approximately 50%. The culprit behind this abnormal pricing behaviour is a major drought that is scorching one-half the breadbasket of America. The U.S. Department of Agriculture declared on July 11 that more than 1,000 counties in 26 states are natural-disaster areas, the biggest such declaration ever!
Climate change provides an important but commonly unreported background for recently failed states like Syria.
The Arab Spring uprisings of last year brought to surface political and economic issues, but, behind the scenes, climate stress played as big a role. The warning behind Syria’s disruptive climate change, i.e., drought, is chilling. Syrian farmlands north and east of the Euphrates River are the breadbasket of the Middle East, and up to 60% of Syria’s land experienced one of the worst droughts on record from 2006-11. In the northeast and the south, nearly 75% suffered total crop failure. Herders in the northeast lost 85% of their livestock. According to the UN, 800,000 Syrians had their livelihoods totally wiped out, moving to the cities to find work or into refugee camps. Furthermore, the drought pushed three million Syrians into extreme poverty. As of January 2012, Abeer Etefa of the World Food Programme, states, “Food inflation in Syria remains the main issue for citizens.” And, it is believed to be one of the major causes of domestic unrest.
