Adherents of Islam consider suicide to be one of the greatest of all spiritual transgressions, so when an Iraqi farmer recently took his own life because he could no longer maintain his crops amid chronic water shortages, it could not have been an easy decision.
Even worse, 54 year-old Salman Habib left behind seven children and four other dependents, according to AFP.
Officials from Al-Islah in Dhi Qar province say that one thousand families have abandoned their land in the last two years as a result of escalating water shortages. The mayor, Ali Hussein Raddad, told AFP that Habib suffered severe psychological problems resulting from the economic struggles, which eventually led him to take his own life.
Water shortages in the region can be traced to reduced flow along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers as a result of dams and other upstream developments (in Turkey and Syria) and desertification.
By 2009, the desert had already usurped 39 percent of the country’s surface and an additional 54 percent faces a similar threat, the environmental ministry reports. That amounts to 93 percent of the country overtaken by desert if nothing is done to curtail it.
Each year, Iraq loses approximately 96 square miles of arable land to environmental degradation of some kind. This is a travesty given that the agricultural sector in the last few decades has been the second largest source of jobs and the second most important contributor to the country’s gross domestic product – after fossil fuels.
The lead image depicts fresh produce being sold at a Baghdad market in 1999. More than a decade later, images like this will be harder to find and in another decade still, we have to wonder if they will be found at all.
:: Yahoo
Image credit: Iraq food market in 1999, Shutterstock
Author: Tafline Laylin
As a tour leader who led “eco-friendly” camping trips throughout North America, Tafline soon realized that she was instead leaving behind a trail of gas fumes, plastic bottles and Pringles. In fact, wherever she traveled – whether it was Viet Nam or South Africa or England – it became clear how inefficiently the mandate to re-think our consumer culture is reaching the general public. Born in Iran, raised in South Africa and the United States, she currently splits her time between Africa and the Middle East. Tafline can be reached at tafline (at) greenprophet (dot) com.
The drought in the USA is getting worse. Where I come from, Oklahoma, big wild fires have been raging. More than 25 states have been declared disaster areas.
Here in Israel, we’re drinking sea water – desalinated of course.
Obviously the drought is global, yet no one seems willing to talk about it. Are these the “End Times”?