NHNE News List
Current Members: 1345
Subscribe/unsubscribe/archive info at the bottom of this message.

NHNE Spring Summer 2005 Fundraiser:
Money needed = $4,944.00
Donations to date = $1,151.00
Number of people who have helped = 17
Funds still needed = $3,793.00
To make a tax-deductible donation:
NHNE Website: http://tinyurl.com/8su4u
PayPal: http://tinyurl.com/7jyub
eMail: nhne@...
Phone: (928) 282-6120
Fax: (815) 642-0117
Mail: NHNE, P.O. Box 2242, Sedona, AZ 86339
Credit Cards: Please include number, expiration date, phone number.
Your donations are tax-deductible. Thank you!

------------

DESERTS SET TO EXPAND
By Michael Hopkin
Nature
June 16, 2005

http://www.nature.com/news/2005/050613/pf/050613-7_pf.html

Many of the world's dry regions, currently home to some 2.1 billion people,
are in danger of becoming useless for growing food, according to the latest
in a series of reports on the world's ecosystems. It blames climate change
and human activities.

The report's authors estimate that 10-20% of these 'drylands' have already
lost some plant life or economic use, and they say the situation is getting
worse. Hundreds of thousands of people will be in need of new homes and
lifestyles over the next 30 years, they estimate.

The report, titled Ecosystems and Human Well-Being: Desertification
Synthesis, is the third in a series of seven detailing the findings of the
Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, a four-year, US$22-million stocktake of the
world's biological resources.

The assessment aims to compile all of the available data from previous
studies to give the most accurate picture yet of the condition of the
world's ecosystems. In the case of drylands it highlights the lack of
knowledge about these regions, which cover 41% of the planet's land surface.
They include everything from the 'dry-sub-humid' regions of eastern
Mediterranean croplands, to full-blown 'hyper-arid' deserts such as the
Sahara.

"There are serious gaps in our understanding of how big deserts are, and how
they are growing," says Zafar Adeel, assistant director of the United
Nations University International Network on Water, Environment and Health in
Hamilton, Canada, and one of the report's main authors.

What is clear, however, is that deserts are getting bigger. "Desertification
has emerged as an immense global problem that affects a lot of people,"
Adeel says. Dust storms from the Gobi Desert in Asia and the African Sahara
are responsible for respiratory problems as far afield as North America, the
report says.

Fields of dreams

Perhaps the biggest problem, however, is that as land dries up it becomes
unsuitable for farming. The problem is worsened by the fact that many of the
areas at greatest risk, such as central Asia and regions to the north and
south of the Sahara, are home to the world's poorest people. "Without strong
efforts to reverse desertification, some of the gains we've seen in
development in these regions may be reversed," Adeel says.

The report's release comes ahead of the World Day to Combat Desertification
on 17 June. This day marks the 11th birthday of a United Nations agreement,
signed by 191 countries, to tackle the expansion of deserts. But, says
Adeel, previous efforts have been hampered by ignorance of the scale of the
problem.

Solutions should be tailored to individual countries' situations, the
authors recommend. They hope that governments of countries at risk of drying
up will promote 'alternative livelihoods' that protect dry regions.

This could involve investment in ecotourism rather than farming, Adeel
suggests. Other possibilities involve embracing solar power, or farming fish
rather than irrigating crops, which turns out to be a more efficient way of
wringing food and money from a limited amount of water.

Walter Reid, director of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, estimates it
might take US$100 billion to invest properly in dryland areas. "That's
substantial. But relative to other areas where public money is spent it's
not such a big deal," says Reid.

------------

NHNE News List:

To subscribe, send a message to:
nhnenews-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

To unsubscribe, send a message to:
nhnenews-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com

To review current posts:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/nhnenews/messages

Published by David Sunfellow
NewHeavenNewEarth (NHNE)
eMail: nhne@...
NHNE Website: http://www.nhne.com/
Phone: (928) 282-6120
Fax: (815) 642-0117

Appreciate what we are doing?
You can say so with a tax-deductible donation:
http://www.nhne.com/main/donations.html

P.O. Box 2242
Sedona, AZ 86339