Spread of desert "may cause Mediterranean exodus"
Pastor Dale Morgan
*Spread of desert "may cause Mediterranean exodus"*
20 Mar 2007 17:55:51 GMT
Source: Reuters
By Karolos Grohmann
ATHENS, March 20 (Reuters) - Parched land could trigger a mass exodus
north from the Mediterranean if the long-term effects of climate change,
construction and farming are not checked, a Greek environmental official
warned on Tuesday.
Swathes of Greece are also in immediate danger of becoming permanent
desert, said Professor Costas Kosmas, head of a government committee set
up to battle desertification.
"Desertification is a slow-moving process and once we realise it is
happening it will be too late to go back," Kosmas told Reuters in an
interview.
Desertification is being fuelled by a reduction in average rainfall
coupled with higher temperatures, deforestation and human activities
such as farming, construction and tourism. Kosmas said long-term
environmental changes meant all countries across the Mediterranean basin
would eventually be affected -- and that populations would drift to
cooler north European latitudes.
"Desertification means that people cannot earn a living off the land so
they move. They become migrants, flocking to urban areas," he said.
"Northern European countries have accepted this, though we (in the
region) need to start taking specific measures immediately because we
have done little until now."
Greece, which is the committee's main focus, has been experiencing one
of its worst droughts in 20 years and its landscape will change
substantially within the next decade, Kosmas said.
Greece's average rainfall has fallen by about 30 percent since the mid
1970s, and last January was the driest in half a century.
"About 34 or 35 percent of the country has been highlighted by us as
extreme danger areas that face desertification, with great repercussions
for humans and the economy," Kosmas said.
Parts of the southern Peloponnese region, many of the Aegean islands
popular with tourists, as well as northern, central Greece and the wider
Athens region are at high risk.
Greece, one of the fastest growing economies in the euro zone, is
experiencing a construction boom and a sharp rise in tourism that has
strained natural resources.
Tens of thousands of holiday homes are being built this year alone to
meet the demand from foreigners, and the construction industry has been
growing by a third every year since 2000.
But Kosmas said the economic benefits could soon be outweighed by
long-term environmental damage.
"The areas in danger have seen a large part of the earth disappearing,
leaving maybe 30 or 40 centimetres of top layer earth. They are unfit
for farming, forests will not be able to grow back, rain does not
trickle down."