Think we’re dry? Think again
Afew months ago I was lucky enough to do a lap around Australia on my motorcycle. Of course, Australia was in the middle of the significant drought they’ve been having over there, and I did see some sad sights.
Three I found particularly heartbreaking.
The first was when I was riding along a very lonely dirt road in the Northern Territory and it was hot as hell. There was literally nothing growing but a few dead sticks. A big sky. Then out of nowhere, I came across half a dozen brahmintype cattle – the skinniest, boniest cattle I had ever seen. There wasn’t a blade of grass for them to eat, heaven knows where the nearest water was, and they had no shade. These cattle were living on dirt and had a look of abject despondency. I couldn’t believe that they were still alive.
When I saw the second, I’d looped down into western New South Wales, which had been in drought for years. There was no grass, but at least there were some trees. Somewhere near Broken Hill, a farmer had fed out a line of grain to his stock. These gaunt scraggy sheep were munching for their lives. But amongst the sheep, I kid you not, were kangaroos, hoeing down. I was flabbergasted. Even the kangaroos couldn’t find enough to eat. Apparently there are 28 million kangaroos in New South Wales alone, all competing for feed with the stock.
For the third, I’d pulled up for a rest several hundred kilometres up the road when I noticed a bunch of sheep standing in a circular mob.
It took a while for me to realise that they were standing in a dried-out pond. Or billabong as they are called in Australia. Just standing there, ragged and encrusted in red dirt waiting for someone to turn on the tap. At the time it wrung my heart.
Back in New Zealand, our summer is proving to be a scorcher. We’ve had temperatures into the mid-30s, Wakefield almost burnt down in a forest fire and irrigators are going flat out all over the country.
Apparently, all this hot air is getting dragged over from Australia. Usually, the Tasman Sea changes this, but right now it’s warmer than usual, so the air is arriving here warmer than it would often be, says NIWA principal scientist Chris Brandolino.
What’s more, European scientists are forecasting that the next four years could be unusually warm. Here in New Zealand, scientists say the likelihood of a heat wave rises when global mean temperatures are higher.
Growing conditions on farms are very different depending on whether we have a La Nina or El Nino weather pattern. La Nina brings wet weather with more storms to eastern New Zealand while El Nino brings hot, dry weather particularly to east coast regions and, very often, droughts.
If higher global temperatures hit New Zealand, we could be looking at hotter El Nino conditions than usual, which would affect our farmers and our food production.
The most obvious impact is on crops. Volumes plummet during a drought and then rebound again after the drought has broken.
The impact on meat and wool is a little more complicated. Once drought conditions are in for the long haul, livestock farmer knock back their stock numbers because they can’t feed them, which results in a temporary surge in the volume of meat production. When the drought breaks, meat production falls as farmers are hell-bent on rebuilding their herds. A look at Australia shows that longterm drought has had broader impacts on the whole economy.