More than 10 million people have died due to recurrent drought in the past century, the UN reports. The global death toll is equivalent to half the population of Malawi, one of the most frequently affected African countries.

The report from the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) shows that Africa was the worst-hit continent by severe, with more than 300 events recorded in the past 100 years. This accounts for 44 per cent of the global total.

Drought keeps scorching the livelihoods of farmers who depend on rain-fed crops

Recently, dramatic consequences of climate disasters have become more frequent and intense in sub-Saharan Africa, including Malawi.

Drought keeps wiping out the livelihoods of Malawians in the Shire Valley, where Tropical Storm Ana destroyed crops in January. This disrupted a rise from the prolonged drought that followed Cyclone Idai in 2019.

Group village head Mwananjovu says severe droughts have become a familiar tragedy for his farming

Drought episodes deepen hunger and poverty as people spend more buying food instead of investing in enhancing their livelihoods and acquiring assets, laments the traditional leader.

In May, UNCCD reported that since 2000, the number and duration of droughts had risen 29 percent and kept worsening.

Humanity is “at a crossroads” when it comes to managing drought and accelerating mitigation must be done “urgently, using every tool we can,” reads the new report.

It calls for a full global commitment to making drought preparedness and resilience a top priority.

The authoritative compilation of drought-related information helps inform negotiations of one of several decisions by UNCCD’s 196 member States, including Malawi.

UNCCD executive secretary Ibrahim Thiaw said the facts and figures all point in the same direction: an upward trajectory in the duration of droughts and the severity of impacts.

This is “not only affecting human societies but also the ecological systems upon which the survival of all life depends, including that of our own species”, he said.

Droughts represent 15 percent of natural disasters, but took the largest human toll, with approximately 650 000 deaths from 1970 to 2019.

The authors project that this year, more than 2.3 billion people face water stress and almost 160 million children are exposed to severe droughts.

Up to 700 million people will be at risk of being displaced by drought by 2030 unless nations step up action against climate change, they warn.

“By 2050, droughts may affect over three-quarters of the world’s population and some 4.8 to 5.7 billion people will live in areas that are water-stressed for at least one month each year, up from 3.6 billion today,” shows the report.

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