Brutal drought lingers in Brazil

[knocker]

Brazil's northeast interior has been experiencing a severe drought in what should be the rainy season.

"What falls from the sky does not fill a glass of water," Raimundo, a farmer, said. Natural vegetation, which would normally provide food for livestock, has dried up and many ranchers cannot afford to buy imported feed for their herds. Many farmers are on the brink of collapse, while others have given up on ranching and have moved to other parts of the country in search of work.

President Dilma Rousseff previously announced $1bn in aid to all of those affected by the drought, but many ranchers are having trouble feeding themselves and their cattle are dying in record numbers.

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/inpictures/2013/03/2013327134417357984.html

[mike Meehan]

Am I right in thinking that this area was originally tropical rain forest which was cleared to create pasture for cattle? - if so it is little wonder that the area has become drier - as far as I am aware forested areas are quite a big player in climate -not only do they take in a lot of CO2 but during respiration the leaves of these forest trees put a good deal of water vapour back into the atmosphere which increases overall rainfall over a wider area.

Turn it into pasture and there is nothing like the same feedback and not only that cattle fart putting more greenhouse gas into the atmospere in the form of methane which is more effective at keeping the heat in than the CO2.