.... But a severe drought has dried local water supplies and has withered crops and grazing fields, killing nearly 80 percent of livestock in some areas.
.... In the Thar and Khudzar districts, about 300 to 400 people have died over the past three months from malnutrition, water borne diseases and viral infections, according to Tanveer Arif of the Pakistan-based Society for Conservation and Protection of Environment (SCOPE). Thousands of people have migrated from these drylands in search of food and water. Many families, however, are reluctant to leave their ancestral lands.
After touring affected regions, experts from the international relief organization Oxfam warned that some areas could face a famine similar to the one currently threatening thousands of people in Ethiopia. The team, which is preparing to launch a relief effort, said that a wide band stretching from southern Afghanistan to Pakistan and Gujarat in India had been badly affected by the searing drought. Many of the areas have been parched of rainwater for three consecutive years, with an almost total lack of rain during the past winter.
The economic impact of the drought has been severe. Market prices for livestock have plummeted and, in lower-lying areas where wheat crops are usually grown, fields lay barren from the lack of rainfall. Now there is a shortage of wheat flour in the local markets and the yield is being rationed among the hungry population.
.... Traditionally, people and animals share the same water sources, either drinking from wells or natural springs. As these begin to dry up, the risk of spreading disease through contamination increases dramatically with people and animals sharing the last remaining water sources.
.... Tanveer Arif from SCOPE, which is associated with the U.N. Convention on Combating Desertification (CCD), is urging other relief organizations to become involved and help prevent a wide-scale disaster. "As drought is a preventable disaster, we are trying to raise alarm among government and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Pakistan. We believe communities and local governments may be mobilized to develop mitigation efforts to combat drought and desertification," Arif said. Mitigation strategies, he suggested, include water resource development projects such as small check dams, water-harvesting structures, fodder storage banks, separate storage for clean water and the introduction of drought resistant crops.
Even if the mitigation projects were to begin today, it could be too late for some of the nomads in the most severely affected regions. "We predict a shoot up in drought deaths and massive migrations in the very near future if the drought persists," said Arif. "Water is rapidly diminishing and the very life support system is crumbling in these areas. Therefore immediate relief work in drought hot spots like Khudzar, Thar, Cholistan, Kharan and Loralai districts is badly needed."