Freak rainstorms wreak havoc in Niger desert
AFP Wired World 20 Jun 2016 02:54 (South Africa)
Unusually
heavy rains in Niger's desert north in recent days have killed
thousands of goats and cattle, gutted homes and stores, and left three
people dead, national television said Monday. "Torrential rains
caused severe damage and three dead in Bazagor", a town in the
northwestern province of Tchintabaradene, and destroyed 100 stores and
100 homes, said Tele Sahel. In Ingal, near the northern city of
Agadez, "85 millimetres (3 inches) of rain fell in two hours" on June
14, though yearly rainfall is rarely over 100 to 130 millimetres there.
Hundreds
of people have been left homeless in the past days with more than 8,000
goats, sheep, cattle and camel killed in the area, where animal corpses
are visible over 20 kilometres, television footage showed. Sub-Saharan Niger, a vast arid nation, regularly suffers food shortages due to drought.
But early this month the UN warned of floods in 2016 affecting the livelihoods of more than 100,000 people. Climate
change has wrought havoc in Niger, bringing floods, droughts, spikes in
temperature and food shortages -- buffeting the lives and livelihoods
of millions of the country's farmers.
Flooding in 2012 killed more
than 100 people, affected more than half a million Nigeriens and caused
at least 135 million euros ($145 million) worth of damage, according to
the disaster prevention office. Floods similarly killed dozens of people and affected hundreds of thousands in 2014 and 2015. Global warming is only worsening the problems, with the steadily encroaching desert now covering three-quarters of Niger.
hb/kc/ccr/ric
© 1994-2016 Agence France-Presse AFP Wired World
http://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2016-06-20-freak-rainstorms-wreak-havoc-in-niger-desert/#.V3LYTo5RnE8
