Publication Date March 31, 2016 | Phys.org

Rivers turn to dust as drought bites Somalia

Somalia
Photo: BBC
Photo: BBC

Somalia's bread basket has become a dust bowl as the life-giving waters of the mighty Shabelle river run dry amid intense drought in the war-torn country.

River-fed farmlands have become parched playgrounds for children who kick footballs beneath a cloudless sky, as one sign among many of the failed rains that the United Nations warns has put more than a million  at risk.

Elders in the Lower and Middle Shabelle regions, where most people rely on farming for survival, said it is the first time in decades they have seen such  shortages in the river