Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
poorest countries made up the Sahel. Land degrada-
tion continued, with more wells being drilled to
support the rebuilding and expansion of livestock
herds. Governments could not control the population
expansion, and relied heavily upon food imports to
feed people - even under favorable conditions. The
1983 drought was a repeat performance. The same
script was dusted off; the same national and interna-
tional responses were replayed. This time, however,
rather than beginning in the west and moving east, the
drought began in Ethiopia and moved westward into
the Sudan. If it had not been for a chance filming by a
British television crew, the drought would again have
gone unnoticed. This chance discovery evoked two
international responses never previously seen: the first
attempt to implant drought aid in an area before a
drought, and the efforts of Bob Geldof. Both of these
responses will be discussed at length towards the end
of this chapter.
Besides the obvious point about weak, impoverished
national governments being incapable or unwilling to
deal with drought, there are two points to be made
about the continuing drought in the African Sahel.
Firstly, Sahelian droughts have large temporal vari-
ability. It has already been emphasized, in Chapter 2,
that most droughts worldwide appear to coincide with
the 18.6-year lunar cycle. What has not been
emphasized is the fact that this lunar cycle may be
superimposed upon some longer term trend. The
Sahelian droughts persisted for three decades.
Secondly, some developed countries may not have
experienced their worst drought. For instance, the
1982-1983 Australian drought was the worst in
200 years. The next worst drought in 200 years
occurred in 1993-1995 and again in 2002-2003. There
is evidence from tree-ring studies that some droughts in
Australia in the last two to three centuries have lasted as
long as the present Sahelian conditions. Western coun-
tries should not be so ready to chastise the governments
of Sahelian countries about their inability to deal with
drought. Australia, and many other countries, has yet to
be tested under similar conditions over such a long
period - conditions that should be viewed as likely
under our present climatic regime.
question arises whether any African country can really
cope with drought. There is one notable exception to
the bleak news, namely what has been achieved in
Botswana. Botswana, in 1986, was in its fifth consecu-
tive year of drought - a record that easily matches that
of any country in the Sahel. Yet no one appeared to
be dying from starvation, although two-thirds of its
inhabitants were dependent upon drought relief.
Botswana occupies the southern hemisphere equiva-
lent of the Sahel region of Africa, at the edge of the
Kalahari Desert. Long-term droughts have continually
afflicted the country, with average rainfall varying
erratically from 300 to 700 mm yr
-1
. The country has
become newly independent in the last two decades;
but, unlike other decolonized African countries, it has
not been wracked by intertribal conflict and has an
administration that is open to self-criticism. After a
single year of drought in 1980, the government
commissioned an independent study on drought-relief
efforts, finding measures severely wanting. Following
that report, the government overhauled the storage
and distribution network, to the point that 90 per cent
of the population requiring food aid during the 1986
drought year received uninterrupted supplies. The
government also instituted a program of early warning
that tracked the intensity of the drought in Botswana.
Every month rainfall figures were collected and
analyzed to produce a contour map that pinpointed
those areas favorable for cropping and those areas in
stress. In 1983, a computer model was initiated that
predicted soil moisture and maximum crop yield. The
model takes rainfall data and makes projections of crop
yield until harvesting, based upon the premise of 'no
stress' and 'continuing stress'. This model is updated
with daily rainfall readings fed into a centralized
collecting agency via two-way radio from all parts of
the country. The model permits farmers to ascertain
the risk to crops if they are planted now, the risk to
crops if they are cultivated, and the risk to crops if
harvesting is postponed. Because soil moisture is
calculated in the model, it is possible to determine
the reserves of soil moisture from the previous crop
year.
Botswana monitors the state, not only of its agricul-
ture, but also of its people. Each month, two-thirds of
its children under the age of five are weighed at health
clinics, to detect undernourished children with a body
weight less than 80 per cent the expected weight for
their age. Areas where drought effects are manifesting
Thos
e that win
(Charnock, 1986)
Given the persistence of the African drought, and the
fact that so many people face a losing battle, the
