Word: drought
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...genetically modified rice that is fortified with beta-carotene--which the body converts into vitamin A--and additional iron, and they are working on other kinds of nutritionally improved crops. Biotech can also improve farming productivity in places where food shortages are caused by crop damage attributable to pests, drought, poor soil and crop viruses, bacteria or fungi...
Viruses often cause massive failure in staple crops in developing countries. Two years ago, Africa lost more than half its cassava crop--a key source of calories--to the mosaic virus. Genetically modified, virus-resistant crops can reduce that damage, as can drought-tolerant seeds in regions where water shortages limit the amount of land under cultivation. Biotech can also help solve the problem of soil that contains excess aluminum, which can damage roots and cause many staple-crop failures. A gene that helps neutralize aluminum toxicity in rice has been identified...
...This year, the council showed signs of financial restraint in the face of the upcoming drought...
Should food aid to a needy country be tied to how its government behaves? For these two forlorn children in the drought-ravaged wasteland of Ethiopia's southeast, the answer may well determine if they live or die. The pair number among millions of largely nomadic people in the vast Horn of Africa region, threatened once again by famine. Three straight years of scant rainfall have caused the blistering of large tracts of grazing land, killing off herds of livestock and resulting in the death of hundreds of people, a figure that could rise alarmingly in coming months. Several countries...
Last week, USA Today reported almost eight million Ethiopians face severe food shortages as a result of several continuing months of drought. The newspaper also remarked that continuing rainfalls are expected to worsen conditions after the recent floods in Mozambique. This coverage represents a step in the right direction. But in addition to ignoring other countries in the horn of Africa--which would have doubled the number of starving people in the article's statistics--the paper found these events worthy to fill only a two-inch column of text. Even worse, the information was located on page...