The drought, famine and spreading deserts that have plagued Africa for the past 30 years look set to get worse as the global climate changes.
Most Africans live between the parched deserts and dripping rainforests in regions of variable rainfall where small changes have big impacts on water and food supplies. To assess future vulnerability, Maarten de Wit of the University of Cape Town in South Africa used existing hydrological data to calculate the likely effects of expected climate change on 2 million kilometres of the continent’s rivers (Science, DOI: 10.1126/science.1119929).
The 100 million or so people living in…
