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The Best Science Writing Online 2012
Showcasing more than fifty of the most provocative, original, and significant online essays from 2011, The Best Science Writing Online 2012 will change the way...
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The vast region of deserts, grasslands and sparse woodlands that stretches across the Sahel, the Horn of Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia is by far the most crisis-ridden part of the planet. With the exception of a few highly affluent states in the Persian Gulf, these dryland countries face severe and intensifying challenges, including frequent and deadly droughts, encroaching deserts, burgeoning populations and extreme poverty. The region scores at the very bottom of the United Nations’s Index of Human Development, which ranks countries according to their incomes, life expectancy and educational attainments.
As a result of these desperate conditions, the dryland countries are host to a disproportionate number of the world’s violent conflicts. Look closely at the violence in Afghanistan, Chad, Ethiopia, Iraq, Pakistan, Somalia and Sudan—one finds tribal and often pastoralist communities struggling to survive deepening ecological crises. Water scarcity, in particular, has been a source of territorial conflict when traditional systems of land management fail in the face of rising populations and temperatures and declining rainfall.
Washington looks at many of these clashes and erroneously sees Islamist ideology at the core. Our political leaders fail to realize that other Islamic populations are far more stable economically, politically and socially—and that the root of the crisis in the dryland countries is not Islam but extreme poverty and environmental stress.
The Washington mind-set also prefers military approaches to developmental ones. The U.S. has supported the Ethiopian army in a military incursion into Somalia. It has pushed for military forces to stop the violence in Darfur. It has armed the clans in the deserts of western Iraq and now proposes to arm pastoralist clans in Pakistan along the Afghan border.
The trouble with the military approach is that it is extremely expensive and yet addresses none of the underlying problems. Indeed, the U.S. weapons provided to local clans often end up getting turned on the U.S. itself at a later date. Tellingly, one of the greatest obstacles to posting the proposed peacekeeping troops to Darfur is the lack of a water supply for them. Given the difficulty of finding water for those 26,000 soldiers, it becomes easier to understand the severity of the ongoing and unsolved water crisis facing the five million to seven million residents of Darfur.
Fortunately, much better solutions exist once the focus is put squarely on nurturing sustainable development. Today many proven techniques for “rainwater harvesting” can collect and store rain for later use by people, livestock and crops. In some areas, boreholes that tap underground aquifers can augment water availability; in others, rivers and seasonal surface runoff can be used for irrigation.
Such solutions may cost hundreds of dollars per household, spread out over a few years. This outlay is far too much for the impoverished households to afford but far less than the costs to societies of conflicts and military interventions. The same is true for other low-cost interventions to fight diseases, provide schooling for children and ensure basic nutrition.
To end the poverty trap, pastoralists can increase the productivity of livestock through improved breeds, veterinary care and scientific management of fodder. Often pastoralists can multiply their incomes by selling whole animals, meat products, processed goods (such as leather) and dairy products. The wealthy states of the Middle East are a potentially lucrative nearby market for the livestock industries of Africa and Central Asia.
To build this export market, pastoralist economies will need help with all-weather roads, storage facilities, cell phone coverage, power, veterinary care and technical advice, to mention just a few of the key investments. With crucial support and active engagement of the private sector, however, impoverished dryland communities will be able to take advantage of transformative communications technologies and even gain access to capital from abroad.
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11 Comments
Add CommentJeffrey Sachs is another know-it-all scientist. Wars cause poverty but poverty, in my opinion, does not cause wars. Israel and Singapore are examples of countries started in poverty with relatively few natural resources per capita who flourished and whose population didn't fight each other or fight any wars except in self defense. Russia under Yeltzin has vastly increasing income from natural resources and yet crime, corruption, cronyism, press freedoms and respect for individuals are all going in the wrong direction. It's idealogy, not drought that causes wars. Personally I think it's crappy ideology that causes most poverty also.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs a former engineer and one who ran an NGO in Sahelian African, and consulted in village scale development projects in Iraq, Pakistan, Turkey and elsewhere, I honor Jeffrey Sachs as a source of lucent development perspectives. As an author of a work on dryfarming I agree that sustainable development is an imperative in the drylands areas. Where conflict exists or is immanent however, military force seems a practical necessity to re-create a peaceful framework in which sustainable development can be conducted. I would further add to the menu of capital intensive suggestions Dr. Sachs recommends that legal issues such as land ownership reforms (who posseses, controls/benfits from imrovemnts) and low tech/ labor intensive solutions like agro-forestry and sylvo-pastoral systems must be part of the sustainable development mix.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUnless government can enforce wise soil conservation practices these areas are doomed. We can help by teaching them how to conserve thir land, use efficient stoves, and reclaim the desert. The disorganization of these tribal societies, and their hostile nature does not make this look promising.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe expansion of drylands and deserts worldwide is not a new phenomenon in nature but a continuing process of geologic development. The crisis Mr. Sachs draws our attention to is one of human overpopulation.And althought changes in environment are occuring slowly, the population has not and maybe cannot adapt quickly enough to avert the horrifing events we have witnessed of late: famine, starvation, cruel and selfish behavior leading to genocidal attacks and warfare. Here at home vast drylands and deserts of American SW, Mexico, both recent in geologic times, are undergoing unprecedented population expansions at this very moment. Huge sprawling cities such as Greater Phoenix and Las Vegas didn't exist 60 years ago. Overpopulation is problem and there may not be a solution we can accept.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNational Geographic ran a story in July about how a huge underground supply of water was found in northwestern Sudan. Satellite data of the eastern Sahara revealed the contours of an ancient basin the size of the U.S.'s Lake Erie. With current U.S. farming and organic waste to fertilizer technology, the end of hunger and conflict in this area is well within our political and economic reach. A complete circle of farm crops, food, organic waste and fertilizer can be created to recycle nearly all that is grown and keep food in great abundance and variety while preserving a natural environment is within our power. All that it will take to end the suffering of all now suffering from the drought in norther Africa, is our willpower to make it happen. I envision a fertile area there growing enough food to meet the needs of not only Africa, but also the Middle East. If such ancient water can be located in other areas, arid land can readily made arable and fecund
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis article ignores one major cause of all the problems and conflicts mentioned: people. Specifically, too many of them. There aren't insufficient resources for the people, there are too many people for the resources. What happens when you feed the poor? They reproduce, and you have more poor. By feeding them, you aggravate the problem. The burgeoning population mentioned in the article is the problem, and without it there would be no crisis. Even if we institute all the solutions suggested, it won't be long before the population is in the same condition as now, only there will be a lot more people. Population control is the most important aspect of rehabilitation of an area like this. In fact, it's the only thing that will help in the long run.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThanks to Mr. Herbo21k for pointing this out ahead of me. I don't know why mine posted twice, I hope this one doesn't appear twice as well.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI find Exigeus and Smooreieee have interesting views, but I give Exigeus more credit as being on-target. Smooreieee, we can blame the people, but they are in the difficult situation because the land and climate in Africa is poor for farming - read "Guns, Germs, and Steel" for more information on the history of continents and regions. But Exigeus makes an important point - population control, based on information and wise choices, is key. Otherwise, we may feed them today and have a worse crisis of a denuded region and more people with less to eat, in 10 or 20 years.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI can never forget the millions that died in the USSR from shock treatment, which Mr. Sachs pushed on them. I was there not long after. I saw it. Ivory tower types should not be in charge of economies. Men like Putin or Thatcher should. This article posits a common naive, notion, that poverty (here, in the guise of drylands) drives war. This is similar to the "common knowledge" that terrorists are lone wolves performing desperate acts because of poverty. This is sophomoric nonsense. Ideology drives war. Just like preachers do not cause prostitution, (a classic statistical example) if one looks at a map of those conflicts, there is an obvious ideological base. Militant Islam covers the region, and there is war. Secondarily, warlordism drives war, as in southern Africa, and it is integral to the methods within the sphere of Islam. Ideology. It drove the wars of the last century, when the "drylands" were relatively peaceful. And it drives the wars and crises today.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe comments by Plew and Creswell are right on target, and follow your original thinking closely.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI would support these views strongly, also based on many years experience in development activities in the livestock and pastoral industries.
To: Jeffrey D. Sachs
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHave you or anyone read recent article on the subject of Dafur water problem. I have written a short article on it. I will search the original article. You wwill find it very interesting. Thank you.
Lucien Beauley,
Intro:
A Man with a Humanitarian Destiny
We need visionaries in this world. Farouk el Bas, having been finely honed by time, is one of those individuals. His goal, his paths and his well sculptured preordained destiny are seemingly set in stone and the harvest and benefits from his efforts are immeasurable.
http://www.newsflavor.com/World/Africa/A-Man-with-a-Humanitarian-Destiny.100403