Pretty much any region of the world can go through a drought, and perhaps we all know what disastrous effects it can have for agriculture, the environment, the economy, health, and so on. Droughts can last for even more than a year in some cases, unfortunately.
According to FoxNews.com, more than half of the continental US has to deal with drought. The publication invokes the statements of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), claiming that the most widespread drought in a few years is likely to expand even more.
New Seasonal Drought Outlook by @NOAA’s @NWSCPC
Key takeaway: drought is now expected to persist in almost the entire West and Plains. Further, drought may develop in many of the few drought-free pockets.
Elsewhere, drought may develop in most of FL and other spots in the East. pic.twitter.com/e6Q1bozm8A
— NIDIS Drought.gov (@DroughtGov) February 17, 2022
Park Williams, who’s a climate hydrologist at UCLA, declared for The Associated Press and as FoxNews.com quotes:
Climate change is changing the baseline conditions toward a drier, gradually drier state in the West and that means the worst-case scenario keeps getting worse,
This is right in line with what people were thinking of in the 1900s as a worst-case scenario. But, today, I think we need to be even preparing for conditions in the future that are far worse than this.
Drought is also affecting parts of Europe during this time, such as Mediterranean regions, according to Reuters. As a result, grasslands and crops such as barley and wheat were affected. The most affected European areas, to be more precise, are north-western Italy, southern Spain and Portugal, as well as south-eastern France.
A statement from the European crop monitor MARS writes, as quoted by Reuters:
Above-average rainfall is needed in the coming weeks and months to avoid an increased risk of negative impacts on crop growth conditions later in the season.
Generally, there are plenty of ways to try overcoming drought. You can use a water-efficient irrigation system for trees, flowers, and shrubs. You can also turn the irrigation down during the fall and shut it down during the winter.
