Spain and Portugal are grappling with a devastating drought which has left rivers nearly dry, sparked deadly wildfires and devastated crops — and experts warn that prolonged dry spells will become more frequent. Photo: AFP file
MADRID: Spain and Portugal are grappling with a devastating drought which has left rivers nearly dry, sparked deadly wildfires and devastated crops — and experts warn that prolonged dry spells will become more frequent.
The national weather office says 94 percent of Portugal is enduring what it classifies as an “extreme” drought.
“The country has never experienced a drought like this in the sense that it worsened significantly in October, a time of the year when the situation normally improves,” a climatologist with the weather office, Fatima Espirito Santo, told AFP.
Two-thirds of Spain has received considerably less rain during the last three years than it normally does.
“It’s a ruinous situation,” said Jose Ramon Gonzalez, a small rancher in Spain’s normally rainy northwestern region of Galicia.
Due to the scarcity of grass, Gonzalez was forced to spend thousands of euros to buy fodder for his cattle in July, four months earlier than normal.
“There are rivers, springs, which neither I, at the age of 45, nor my parents, nor my grandparents, have seen dry which have dried up,” he said.
About 1.38 million hectares (3.4 million acres) of grains, sunflowers and olive trees have been affected by drought or frost in Spain as of the end of October, according to Spanish farming insurance agency Agroseguro.
It has dished out more than 200 million euros ($236 million) in compensation this year.
“You feel helpless like when you are sick, you can’t do anything. This sickness is called drought,” said Vicente Ortiz, a farmer and rancher in Spain’s central Castilla-La Mancha region, whose endless plain is depicted in “Don Quixote”, the famous work by Miguel de Cervantes.
Ortiz said his grain harvest has plunged 70 percent from last year and he expects to harvest half as many olives.
The situation is just as dire for farmers across the border in neighbouring Portugal.
“All crops are suffering from this lack of water in our region, from olives to grains and grapes,” said Fremelinda Carvalho, the president of the association of farmers on Portalegre in central Portugal.
The dry fields and forests have fuelled wildfires, which killed 109 people this year in Portugal and five in Galicia, many dying in their cars as they tried to flee the flames.
Water conflicts
Water reservoirs are at abnormally low levels.
In Portugal 28 of the country’s water reservoirs in October were at less than 40 percent of their storage capacity.
This weekend about a hundred fire trucks began transporting water from one dam in northern Portugal to another that is running dry and supplies water to Viseu, a city of around 100,000 residents.
In Spain the water reservoirs along the Tagus River, which empty into the Atlantic near Lisbon, were as of Monday at just 39.3 percent of their capacity.
The levels were even lower in the Douro River further north and the Segura River, which is used to irrigate crops in southeastern Spain.
Spain’s largest power company, Iberdrola, saw its hydroelectric power production plunge 58 percent during the first nine months of the year, compared to the same period last year, pushing up electricity prices.
The drought is also fuelling conflicts among regions over the use of water.
One source of tension is a massive aqueduct built in the 1960s during the Spanish dictatorship of Francisco Franco to siphon off water from the Tagus River to the smaller Segura River.
The Tagus River “can not support” this aqueduct, said Antonio Luengo, head of the agency that regulates water in Spain’s Castilla-La Mancha region.
The water diverted from the Tagus had been used to massively develop fruit and vegetable farms in southeastern Spain and now water from the Mediterranean must be desalinated to support these crops, he said.
Climate risks
Experts warn that droughts are likely to become more frequent and severe in the region.
“Spain has since 1980 shown signs of climate change, which have increased since 2000,” said Jorge Olcina, who heads the University of Alicante’s climate institute.
The country’s climate “tends to have more subtropical characteristics. Higher temperatures and rarer and more intense rains. So climate-related risks — heatwaves and rain and droughts and floods, will increase in the coming decades,” he added.
Spain has managed water “very badly”, said Julio Barea, spokesman for the Spanish branch of Greenpeace.
He cited as examples the use of water to irrigate trees that do not normally need much water, such as olive and almond trees, and the planting of water-intensive crops that are not suited to Spain’s Mediterranean climate.
Both governments have promised financial aid to farmers, who still anxiously wait for rain.
“We are constantly looking at the sky,” said Ortiz, the rancher in Castilla-La Mancha.
MADRID: Spain and Portugal are grappling with a devastating drought which has left rivers nearly dry, sparked deadly wildfires and devastated crops — and experts warn that prolonged dry spells will become more frequent.
The national weather office says 94 percent of Portugal is enduring what it classifies as an “extreme” drought.
“The country has never experienced a drought like this in the sense that it worsened significantly in October, a time of the year when the situation normally improves,” a climatologist with the weather office, Fatima Espirito Santo, told AFP.
Two-thirds of Spain has received considerably less rain during the last three years than it normally does.
“It’s a ruinous situation,” said Jose Ramon Gonzalez, a small rancher in Spain’s normally rainy northwestern region of Galicia.
Due to the scarcity of grass, Gonzalez was forced to spend thousands of euros to buy fodder for his cattle in July, four months earlier than normal.
“There are rivers, springs, which neither I, at the age of 45, nor my parents, nor my grandparents, have seen dry which have dried up,” he said.
About 1.38 million hectares (3.4 million acres) of grains, sunflowers and olive trees have been affected by drought or frost in Spain as of the end of October, according to Spanish farming insurance agency Agroseguro.
It has dished out more than 200 million euros ($236 million) in compensation this year.
“You feel helpless like when you are sick, you can’t do anything. This sickness is called drought,” said Vicente Ortiz, a farmer and rancher in Spain’s central Castilla-La Mancha region, whose endless plain is depicted in “Don Quixote”, the famous work by Miguel de Cervantes.
Ortiz said his grain harvest has plunged 70 percent from last year and he expects to harvest half as many olives.
The situation is just as dire for farmers across the border in neighbouring Portugal.
“All crops are suffering from this lack of water in our region, from olives to grains and grapes,” said Fremelinda Carvalho, the president of the association of farmers on Portalegre in central Portugal.
The dry fields and forests have fuelled wildfires, which killed 109 people this year in Portugal and five in Galicia, many dying in their cars as they tried to flee the flames.
Water conflicts
Water reservoirs are at abnormally low levels.
In Portugal 28 of the country’s water reservoirs in October were at less than 40 percent of their storage capacity.
This weekend about a hundred fire trucks began transporting water from one dam in northern Portugal to another that is running dry and supplies water to Viseu, a city of around 100,000 residents.
In Spain the water reservoirs along the Tagus River, which empty into the Atlantic near Lisbon, were as of Monday at just 39.3 percent of their capacity.
The levels were even lower in the Douro River further north and the Segura River, which is used to irrigate crops in southeastern Spain.
Spain’s largest power company, Iberdrola, saw its hydroelectric power production plunge 58 percent during the first nine months of the year, compared to the same period last year, pushing up electricity prices.
The drought is also fuelling conflicts among regions over the use of water.
One source of tension is a massive aqueduct built in the 1960s during the Spanish dictatorship of Francisco Franco to siphon off water from the Tagus River to the smaller Segura River.
The Tagus River “can not support” this aqueduct, said Antonio Luengo, head of the agency that regulates water in Spain’s Castilla-La Mancha region.
The water diverted from the Tagus had been used to massively develop fruit and vegetable farms in southeastern Spain and now water from the Mediterranean must be desalinated to support these crops, he said.
Climate risks
Experts warn that droughts are likely to become more frequent and severe in the region.
“Spain has since 1980 shown signs of climate change, which have increased since 2000,” said Jorge Olcina, who heads the University of Alicante’s climate institute.
The country’s climate “tends to have more subtropical characteristics. Higher temperatures and rarer and more intense rains. So climate-related risks — heatwaves and rain and droughts and floods, will increase in the coming decades,” he added.
Spain has managed water “very badly”, said Julio Barea, spokesman for the Spanish branch of Greenpeace.
He cited as examples the use of water to irrigate trees that do not normally need much water, such as olive and almond trees, and the planting of water-intensive crops that are not suited to Spain’s Mediterranean climate.
Both governments have promised financial aid to farmers, who still anxiously wait for rain.
“We are constantly looking at the sky,” said Ortiz, the rancher in Castilla-La Mancha.
97% of Portugal in severe drought, 2,000 Spanish evacuated amid fires
CGTN
The local waterfront in Pampilhosa da Serra, Portugal.
Source(s): AFP ,Reuters
CGTN
The local waterfront in Pampilhosa da Serra, Portugal.
/Sergio Azenha/CFP
More than 97 percent of Portugal is in "severe drought" after its hottest May in almost a century – while a wildfire in southern Spain has caused the evacuation of thousands.
Portugal's national meteorological office IPMA has reported the country's hottest May since 1931, with rainfall in May "much lower than normal", amounting to just 13 percent of the average for May recorded between 1977 and 2000, the reference period.
As a result, there had been a "very significant spread of severe drought", which now affected 97 percent of the country, the IPMA said. A further 1.4 percent of the country is suffering "extreme drought" – the IPMA's highest classification.
Meanwhile, around 2,000 people were evacuated overnight as a fire raged through a forested area of southern Spain in an area badly hit by wildfires just nine months ago.
The blaze began on Wednesday afternoon in the mountainous Sierra Bermeja area, which lies inland from the resort of Estepona. The region is bracing for a heatwave that is expected to push temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius in the coming days.
"Almost 1,000 people" had been drafted in to help efforts to fight the fire and ensure security in the Pujerra area, the 112 emergency services in the southern Andalusia region said on Twitter. Of that number, around 500 were forest firefighters.
Last September, a huge wildfire raged for seven days in the Sierra Bermeja area, killing a firefighter and forcing 2,600 people from their homes as it burned through some 10,000 hectares of land.
The Iberian peninsula experienced a much drier winter than usual – it was Portugal's driest since 1931, with only 277mm of rainfall from October to mid-March.
It was also Spain's second driest and fourth warmest since 1961, according to the meteorological agency Aemet, with the Spanish mainland receiving only the equivalent of 45 percent of the average rainfall for a normal winter.
Scientists say repeated droughts are a sign of climate change. They are expected to become even more frequent, more prolonged and more intense in the future.
More than 97 percent of Portugal is in "severe drought" after its hottest May in almost a century – while a wildfire in southern Spain has caused the evacuation of thousands.
Portugal's national meteorological office IPMA has reported the country's hottest May since 1931, with rainfall in May "much lower than normal", amounting to just 13 percent of the average for May recorded between 1977 and 2000, the reference period.
As a result, there had been a "very significant spread of severe drought", which now affected 97 percent of the country, the IPMA said. A further 1.4 percent of the country is suffering "extreme drought" – the IPMA's highest classification.
Meanwhile, around 2,000 people were evacuated overnight as a fire raged through a forested area of southern Spain in an area badly hit by wildfires just nine months ago.
The blaze began on Wednesday afternoon in the mountainous Sierra Bermeja area, which lies inland from the resort of Estepona. The region is bracing for a heatwave that is expected to push temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius in the coming days.
"Almost 1,000 people" had been drafted in to help efforts to fight the fire and ensure security in the Pujerra area, the 112 emergency services in the southern Andalusia region said on Twitter. Of that number, around 500 were forest firefighters.
Last September, a huge wildfire raged for seven days in the Sierra Bermeja area, killing a firefighter and forcing 2,600 people from their homes as it burned through some 10,000 hectares of land.
The Iberian peninsula experienced a much drier winter than usual – it was Portugal's driest since 1931, with only 277mm of rainfall from October to mid-March.
It was also Spain's second driest and fourth warmest since 1961, according to the meteorological agency Aemet, with the Spanish mainland receiving only the equivalent of 45 percent of the average rainfall for a normal winter.
Scientists say repeated droughts are a sign of climate change. They are expected to become even more frequent, more prolonged and more intense in the future.
Source(s): AFP ,Reuters
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