Drought, sand threaten inhabitants of Sahara
**y UftVIUMAKUN
(C) 1973, The London Observer
DAKAR, Senegal — Trapped
in a vise between the inexorably
advancing sands of the Sahara to
the north and the rains moving up
from the south, several million
Africans and the remnants of
their once mighty herds are
clinging precariously to life.
Successive years of drought
have turned the Sahelian zone,
which stretches across the
continent to the south of the
Sahara, into a massive dustbowl.
The rotting carcasses of
thousands of cattle pockmark the
cracked landscape. Rivers have
shrunk to mere streams and in
places the waters of Lake Chad
have receded up to 12 miles.
Relief workers describe this as
a “creeping disaster” that in the
next few months could kill over 2
million Africans living in
Mauritania, Senegal, Mali,
while Thai rain-makers take
| their business on the road
1
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
BANGKOK —Thai rain-makers are planning two overseas
g trips later this year, one to West Germany and the other to
Australia.
Theparit Devakul, whose rain-making techniques are
g reputed to be successful, said the vists would be their first
g demonstration trips abroad.
Theparit, however, said the group would not be showing the
| Germans how to make artificial rain, “but how to disperse
S the fog at Frankfurt Airport” using techniques developed in
g Thailand.
He said the forthcoming trips demonstrated the growing
;> interest among foreign governments in the rain-making
| techniques developed and proved in Thailand. It is reported
that several hundred thousand acres of maize were saved
from drought damage early this month as a result of ar
tificial rain produced by Theparit’s operation.
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Upper Volta, Niger and Chad.
These six countries have been
declared a disaster area, but
many others across the continent
are suffering from the aftermath
of drought, including Dahomey,
Togo, nothern parts of Nigeria,
Sundan, and Ethiopia.
Just how many people and
cattle have already died is not
known. Initial statistics from the
Food and Agricultural
Organization put the total of dead
cattle, sheep and goats at several
million, but it is now clear that
figures are exaggerated.
The worst affected of the six
countries in the disaster area is
Mauritania. Relief workers
believe that up to 80 per cent of
the country’s 1.2 million people
could be affected by famine in the
next few weeks.
So desperate is the search for
water that camels worth more
than $300 are reported to have
been killed by their owners
puncturing their humps for
water. In Upper Vota, herdsmen
have been squeezing out tfie dung
of their emaciated animals for
water.
The people hardest hit are
largely nomadic herdsmen of the
desert. A few months ago, Ba Ah
madou, for instance, was a
comparatively wealthy man who
owned 200 cattle worth $15,000.
Now their carcasses lie in the
desert. He and 2,000 other people
are huddled together in a new
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village at Mederdra in the desert
in northwest Mauritania, 40 miles
from the nearest road.
The population of Nouakchott,
the capital, has grown by many
thousands and a huge tented
camp has sprung up. Ehel Idi and
his family of 33 are among those
who have arrived there, aban
doning the harsh desert. Early
this year he owned 300 cattle, 50
sheep and 60 goats. Today only 10
sheep and a goat are left alive.
The first report of starvation in
the region came from neigh
boring Mali in mid-June; 78
people are said to have died
between Timbuktu and Gao on
the River Niger. Three American
transport planes have been
flying relief supplies north to
distribution centers, but there is
insufficient transport to move it
on to the estimated 700,000 people
living in the arid desert area
north of Timbuktu.
Mali poses major problems for
the relief workers. Like Upper
Volta, Niger and Chad, it is
landlocked, increasing the dif
ficulties of moving emergency
food into the country. Almost
40,000 tons of relief supplies for
Mali have piled up in the port
here, and the archaic railways
from Dakar to Bamako, the Mali
capital, can carry a maximum of
only 1,500 tons a week.
Other supplies are being moved
in through the Ivory Coast
capital, Abidjan, but the ad
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vancing rains are already
making roads difficult for large
trucks on that route.
The possibility of 2 million
people dying of starvation in the
next few weeks seems slight. But
certainly well over 2 million
people across the north of these
six countries, although inured to
their unequal battle with the
elements, are short of food,
weakened and vulnerable to
disease.
The rains could mean the killer
punch if they make roads im
passable. In these circumstances
it might be necessary to provide
food through parachute drops.
Ideally what is needed is a steady
but light downpour which would
allow planting to begin and the
distribution of relief to continue.
But little is ever ideal in this
environment.
Jim Markin, American
assistant program director of the
Catholic Relief Service, is among
the handful of relief workers who
view the present aid operation
with trepidation. He argues that
the people ars sufficiently har
dened to their climatic burdens to
survive. The current relief
operation, he believes, could in
fact ultimately create greater
famine, for it prevents critical
long-term decisions from being
made.
While few relief workers would
accept this short-term view, the
long-term needs are unanimously
endorsed. Each year the Sahara
is creeping deeper into Africa,
with the livestock, particularly
goats, destroying the en
vironment of the desert’s
southern fringes.
A regional program of
reforestation is needed to build a
green wall against the Sahara’s
encroachment. Undoubtedly it
would cost millions of dollars, but
in the long term it would prove
cheaper than the provision of
emergency supplies on an in
creasing scale year after year.
In the north of the desert,
Algeria is to begin building a
“green wall” in the autumn
comprising millions of pine,
eucalyptus and other trees
stretching from the borders with
Morocco and Tunisia.
But the greatest danger in the
Sahelian zone today is that once
the present crisis fades the aid
donors will forget about it until
the next appeal.