Word: droughts
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...drought and torrid temperatures quickly threw that forecast off kilter by at least 1 billion bu. The harsh weather arrived just as the corn was entering its crucial tasseling stage and kernels were starting to form. Now cornstalks are dying weeks ahead of schedule, as much of the farm belt's normally rich, brown soil is becoming increasingly yellow and cracked. Says Larry Quandt, who raises corn and soybeans in southern Illinois: "If the drought lasts any longer, it's going to be an extremely rough year...
...stubble-studded earth interrupt shimmering golden carpets of ripening winter wheat. In Nebraska, idle center-pivot sprinklers stand like outsize scarecrows over many once verdant cornfields. In California, more than half of the acreage normally devoted to rice lies uncultivated. The cause of the crop cutback is not drought or disaster but a new federal program that rewards farmers, partly in cash and partly in grain and cotton, for taking large tracts of land out of production. Called payment in kind (PIK), the program aims to invigorate the wilted farm economy by reducing bin-busting surpluses, driving up depressed prices...
BRAZIL. Throughout the northeastern area, known as the Polygon of Drought, 21 million people have now endured four years without meaningful rain. As conditions have deteriorated, violence has erupted throughout the hinterland. In the small, cattle-raising town of Monsenhor Tabosa, 1,000 people from the countryside recently sacked a school commissary when the local mayor began distributing rice, beans and flour. Under similar circumstances, 400 angry villagers stormed the local mayor's office in the remote western town of Senhor Pompeu. So far the Brazilian government has spent $800 million to build dams, aqueducts and wells, while trying...
...PHILIPPINES. As the southern island of Mindanao suffers through its worst drought in 50 years, 3 million farmers have lost some 60,000 tons of rice and corn, causing exportable rice stocks to plunge by 69%. Not even faraway Manila is immune: six major dams, the main source of the capital's water and electricity, may soon have to be closed down. As in other blighted areas, the physical wasteland has become a political minefield. President Marcos' wife Imelda perplexed compatriots in May by reportedly pressing the government into phasing out its $320 million U.S. food-assistance program...
...worldwide picture is not entirely bleak. China, which suffered some kind of drought every year between 1949 and 1982, received a welcome spate of April showers. So too, the worst drought in Australia's history ended last March, when steady rainfall began soaking much of the country. As new seeds have been planted, optimism has flowered. But Australian farmers estimate it could take seven years to undo the damage. In drought-ravaged areas around the world, such problems would seem like blessings. -By Pico Iyer. Reported by Dean Brelis/New Delhi and Gavin Scott/Rio de Janeiro, with other bureaus