From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT
By Paul Homewood
h/t Paul Weldon
Are the droughts in Somalia due to climate change?
Inevitably the long running drought in Somalia has led to claims that climate change is responsible.
The first thing to note though is that the direct cause has been La Nina, which is now into its third years and invariably leads to drought in that part of the world.
But what are the longer term trends?
According to World Bank data, rainfall trends have been steadily increasing since the 1970s and 80s, the time of the Sahel drought which led to the Band Aid concerts, and which were the direct result of global cooling.
Over the longer period little has changed, though occasionally we get exceptionally wet years.
However the World Bank data is incomplete, particularly in the early years, where some regional data is estimated. And, of course, country averages may cover up the areas suffering most.
According to the BBC, the region suffering most from drought is just to the west of Mogadishu, known as the Bay region:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-63116210
https://climateknowledgeportal.worldbank.org/country/somalia/trends-variability-historical
The World Bank has good data for Bay, going back to 1901, and this actually shows a very similar pattern to the national data. Note that rainfall totals are higher than the national ones, which are lower because of the desert region to the north.
Undoubtedly the fact that La Nina is now in its third year has exacerbated the drought, but population growth, a ten-fold increase since 1950, is the main reason why droughts like these, which are perfectly natural and common events, now have such a human impact. The long running civil war, of course, has hardly helped matters either.
<img src=”” title=”Somalia Says Drought Is Due to Climate Change, As They Demand Billions” />
