Drought is a normal recurring feature of the climate
in most parts of the world. It doesn�t get the attention of a tornado,
hurricane or flood. Instead, it�s a slower and less obvious, a much quieter
disaster creeping up on us unawares.
Climate change is currently warming many regions,
warmer temperatures increase the frequency and intensity of heat waves and
droughts.
We can prepare for some climate change consequences
with public education, water conservation programs, limiting pumping from our
freshwater aquifers to recharge rates and putting in place early warning
systems for extreme heat events.
Unfortunately some things cannot be prepared
for�like the pervasiveness and persistence of a hundred year drought caused
by climate change.
The collapse of the world�s earliest known empire
was because of drought.
The Akkadians of
Mesopotamia forged the world's first empire more than 4,300 years ago. The
Akkad�s seized control of cities along the Euphrates River and swept up onto
the plains to the north � in a short period of time their empire stretched
800 miles, all the way from the Persian Gulf to the headwaters of the
Euphrates, through what is now Iraq, Syria and parts of southern Turkey.
Tell Leilan was a small
village founded by some of the world�s first farmers. It�s located in present
day Syria and has existed for over 8,000 years. The Akkad�s conquered Tell Leilan around 2300 B.C. and the area became the
breadbasket for the Akkadian empire.
After only a hundred years the Akkadian
empire started to collapse.
In 1978, Harvey Weiss, a Yale archaeologist, began
excavating the city of Tell Leilan. Everywhere
Weiss dug he encountered a layer of dirt that contained no signs of human
habitation. This dirt layer corresponded to the years 2200 to 1900 B.C. - the
time of Akkad�s fall.
The Curse of Akkad
For the first time since cities were built and
founded,
The great agricultural tracts produced no grain,
The inundated tracts produced no fish,
The irrigated orchards produced neither wine nor
syrup,
The gathered clouds did not rain, the masgurum did not grow.
At that time, one shekel's worth of oil was only
one-half quart,
One shekel's worth of grain was only one-half quart.
. . .
These sold at such prices in the markets of all the
cities!
He who slept on the roof, died on the roof,
He who slept in the house, had no burial,
People were flailing at themselves from hunger.
The events described in "The Curse of
Akkad" were always thought to be fictional. But the evidence Weiss
uncovered at Tell Leilan (along with elevated dust
deposits in sea-cores collected off Oman) suggest that localized climate
change - in Tell Leilan�s case a three hundred year
drought, desertification, was the major cause.
"Since this is probably the first abrupt
climate change in recorded history that caused major social upheaval. It
raises some interesting questions about how volatile climate conditions can
be and how well civilizations can adapt to abrupt crop failures." Dr. Harvey Weiss, Yale University archeologist
Ghost Empire
Perhaps the most notable empire decline due to
drought, or altered precipitation patterns, was the Maya empire. At the peak
of their glory the Maya ranged from Mexico's Yucat�n peninsula to Honduras.
Some 60 Maya cities - each home to upwards of 70,000 people - sprang up
across much of modern day Guatemala, Belize, and Mexico's Yucat�n Peninsula.
"The early Classic Maya period was unusually
wet, wetter than the previous thousand years� Mayan systems were founded on
those [high] rainfall patterns. They could not support themselves when
patterns changed." Douglas Kennett, an
environmental anthropologist at Pennsylvania State University.
During the wettest centuries, from 440 to 660, Maya
civilization flourished.
Then things got worse, much worse. The following
centuries, to roughly 1000 A.D., did not treat the Mayas as kindly, they
suffered repeatedly from drought, oftentimes extreme drought lasting a decade
and more.
Between 1020 and 1100 the region suffered the
longest dry spell in many millennia. The Maya�s suffered crop failure after
failure, famine, death and eventually mass migration.
�Yucatecan lake sediment
cores ... provide unambiguous evidence for a severe 200-year drought from AD
800 to 1000 ... the most severe in the last 7,000 years ... precisely at the
time of the Maya Collapse.� Richardson Gill, The
Great Maya Droughts
After 200 years of drought, in just an eye-blink of
time, famine and drought held sway, most people walked away leaving behind a
ghost empire.
Drought Today
Currently the
percentage of Earth's land area stricken by serious drought is intensifying.
Widespread drying has occurred over much of Europe, Asia, North and South
America, Africa, and Australia.
�Desertification,
along with climate change and the loss of biodiversity, were singled out as
the greatest challenges to sustainable development at the 1992 Rio Earth
Summit. Unfortunately, desertification, land degradation and drought (DLDD)
have accelerated during the 20th and 21st centuries to date, posing
fundamental problems and challenges for drylands
populations, nations and regions in particular.
Severe land
degradation is estimated to be affecting 168 countries around the world,
according to a first-of-its-kind cost-benefit analysis (CBA) of the global
effects of desertification released during the UNCCD Conference and Committee
Meeting held this past April (April, 2013 � editor) in Bonn, Germany. That�s
up sharply from 110 as of a previous analysis of data submitted by UNCCD
parties in the mid-1990s.� Andrew Burger, �Global Warming is Real�
![](../Zadp/Img/20130607els120.jpg) ![](../style/all/img/bouton/Zoom_in_6.png)
�In April 2013,
short-term global drought conditions intensified on all continents except
Antarctica with little relief worldwide. In North America, the
intensification was seen in the Central and Southern Plains of the U.S. and
down into central Mexico. In South America, drought conditions changed little
with severe drought conditions remaining in eastern Brazil and along the
leeward side of the Southern Andes. In Africa, drought intensified along the
equator, especially in the eastern part of the continent and across
Madagascar. In Europe, drought intensified across most of the central part of
the continent. In Asia, drought continued to intensify in southern China and
across Southeast Asia, as well as across southern Russia and northern
Kazakhstan and Mongolia. In Australia, drought intensification occurred in
many inland areas.�drought.gov
�Namibia, already
the driest country in sub-Saharan Africa, is experiencing a severe drought,
with some regions receiving the lowest seasonal rainfall in three decades.� June 3rd 2013, Newsday
�Australians are
some of the world's greatest energy consumers, and people in Perth use more
water than any other city in Australia. Yet theirs is also the driest climate
in the world, and Perth sits right on the edge of a vast desert. Perth sits
above a vast ancient aquifer of 40,000-year-old water that has traditionally
been the main source of drinking water. But in the mid
1970s there was a dramatic shift in climate that resulted in a decline
of between 15% and 20% in winter rainfall. The combination of rising
temperatures and a lack of wet winters has meant a steady decline in water
levels in the aquifer and they are not being recharged. By the mid 1990s, scientists realized they were facing more than
a prolonged drought, that this was in fact climate change.� News.bbc.co.uk
Conclusion
As the earth
warms some regions will get wetter, many much drier.
Climate change,
global warming, drought and desertification. What�s happening in your
particular region should be on your radar screen. Is it?
If not, it should
be.
Richard (Rick) Mills
rick@aheadoftheherd.com
www.aheadoftheherd.com
Richard is the owner of Aheadoftheherd.com and invests in the junior
resource/bio-tech sectors. His articles have been published on over 400
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***
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