Word: aridness
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Punjab's lethal pesticide legacy can be traced to the Green Revolution of the 1960s and '70s, when high-yielding varieties of cotton were introduced in the region's relatively arid Malwa belt. Initially the move was successful as yields and prices were good. But farmers soon discovered that the cotton was highly susceptible to pests, and ended up spending huge amounts on pesticides. As the pests, such as pink bollworm and aphids, became increasingly resistant to chemical spraying, farmers reacted by laying on even more, sometimes mixing two or more products against all scientific evidence. The region virtually became...
That means climate change isn't a problem for tomorrow; the effects are happening now. Already precipitation patterns seem to be changing, making some drier areas - like the arid American southwest - even drier, and rainy regions even wetter. (Which can be almost as destructive as a drought - last year's record-breaking floods in Britain caused $4 billion worth of damage.) As warmer temperatures creep northward, so do insects and other pests that are adapted to the heat. The results can be harrowing - the population of the tiny mountain pine beetle, which infests pine trees in the Rocky Mountain region...
...Some 500 miles from the U.S. border on the Pacific coast, Sinaloa is a crucial battleground in President Felipe Calderon's war on drug cartels - a campaign that the Bush Administration seeks to back with $1.4 billion in cash and equipment. It is in Sinaloa's arid mountains that Mexico's drug trade was born, with peasant farmers first growing opium poppies - the raw ingredient for heroin - back in the 1940s. These pioneers developed violent organized crime structures that later took over the business of supplying marijuana, cocaine and then crystal meth to hungry American consumers - a market worth...
...Even in normal times, the Murray-Darling Basin, which covers parts of four states and the Australian Capital Territory, isn't water rich. On average, it receives a modest 250-300 mm of rain a year, and much of the terrain is semi-arid. Its farmers have mostly thrived until now because over 70% of the country's irrigation resources are concentrated there. But with the drought dragging on, the allocation of surface water to farmers last Southern spring - planting time for rice farmers - was zero...
...Silver’s troubled yet intruiging new novel, “The God of War,” that she takes the greatest risks, stepping back in time and place to a rural Southern California town in 1978 where military planes and water pollution punctuate the arid desert landscape. Tracing a few months in the life of 12-year-old Ares Ramirez, who lives with his mother and his mentally disabled younger brother Malcolm in a trailer home by the sea, the story is one of alienation and self-discovery. Ares’ childhood and family life are unconventional...