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LATIN AMERICA |
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Drought Affects 90 Percent of Argentina
BUENOS AIRES – About 90 percent of Argentine
territory is being affected by the current
drought, although the situation is
aggravated in certain provinces by the
spread of forest fires, figures released
Sunday by officials and the press show.
The most serious situation is taking place
in the central province of La Pampa and in
Buenos Aires and Cordoba in the
north-central region, where thousands of
families are facing temperatures exceeding
30 C (86 F) and are getting along as best
they can with the lack of water.
Some cities, like the tourist destination of
Villa Carlos Paz in Cordoba, decided to
ration drinking water, a move that
complicates the normal functioning of those
areas and affects a number of productive
sectors, including agriculture.
In the northern province of Tucuman, where
rivers and dikes are at levels less than 50
percent of their normal average, residents
have been waiting for it to rain for seven
months and in San Luis in the northwest, no
rain has fallen since last February.
To that situation must be added the forest
fires that have been raging in recent days
in the provinces of Cordoba, San Luis and
Catamarca, in the northwest.
Firefighters in Cordoba, meanwhile, this
weekend are trying to put out several blazes
in mountainous areas, and the San Luis
electrical system was put on emergency alert
due to the fires and the heavy winds in
several parts of the province, officials
said.
In Catamarca, more than 500 hectares (1,250
acres) were destroyed on the weekend by
fires, fed by strong winds, this
circumstance making the work of firefighting
teams difficult.
“Around 90 percent of Argentina is already
suffering, with different intensity, from
the drought,” South American Climatological
Lab director Juan Minetti told the Clarin
newspaper.
Raul Montenegro, an expert on evolutionary
biology, said that “little precipitation”
has been recorded and “the usual (rainfall)
is being delayed this season.”
“The native forests are savings banks
because they store water for the driest
periods. But since the country destroyed
almost all the native pastureland and 75
percent of the forests, we don’t have any
environmental resistance,” Montenegro said.
In contrast, the level of the Parana River
has increased notably due to the intense
rains in Brazil, which have caused flooding
in areas near rivers and have forced
authorities to evacuate about 1,000 people
in the northeastern province of Chaco.
A 17-year-old boy drowned Thursday in a
flooded part of Chaco when he fell off the
horse he was riding, police said.
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