Drought hits Iraq

For centuries, Iraqis only needed to dig small channels and use simple pumps to irrigate the green fields of Iraq that span tens of thousands of acres of fertile land. The ancient Greeks and Romans called the region now occupied by the modern state of Iraq "Mesopotamia", or the Land of the Two Rivers, and during the Islamic period the country was renowned as the "Black Land", a reference to the plantations that history books say then fed some 30 million people.

However, despite this history in today's Iraq it is not only irrigation water that is in short supply. The water resources needed to generate electricity and even tap water are equally lacking, and many experts believe that this is a situation that will only get worse over the years to come.

Even so, unlike the news of the violence that today dominates the international coverage of Iraq, little or no attention is being paid to this tragic situation that threatens the very existence of one of the world's oldest civilisations.

Experts at a conference held in the southern Iraqi port city of Basra last week warned that below- average rainfall and insufficient water in the Euphrates and Tigris rivers have left Iraq bone dry for a third year in a row. Drought has wrecked swaths of farm land, cut power supplies in most Iraqi cities, threatened drinking-water supplies and increased desertification, the experts said, the latter leading to the fierce sandstorms that in recent years have coated much of the country in brown dust.

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http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2009/975/re4.htm