Climate change, pollution and dams threaten Marsh Arabs
On an island surrounded by the narrow waterways of the Chebayesh Marshes in southern Iraq, Sabah Thamer al Baher rises with the sun to milk his herd of water buffalo.
This summer has been tough for Baher, a father of two. Iraq’s 2020-2021 rainfall season was the second driest in 40 years, according to the United Nations, causing the salinity of the wetlands to rise to dangerous levels.
Animals fell sick and died, and Baher was forced to buy fresh drinking water for his own herd of around 20 buffaloes, his only source of income. Another drought is predicted for 2023 as climate change, pollution and upstream damming keep Iraq trapped in a cycle of recurring water crises.
“The marshes are our life. If droughts persist, we will stop to exist, because our whole life depends on water and raising water buffaloes,” said 37-year-old Baher.
Baher and his family are Marsh Arabs, the wetlands’ indigenous population that was displaced in the 1990s when Saddam Hussein dammed and drained the marshes to flush out rebels hiding in the reeds.
After his overthrow in 2003, the marshes were partly reflooded and many Marsh Arabs returned, including Baher’s family. However, conditions have pushed the wetlands’ fragile ecosystem off balance, endangering biodiversity and livelihoods, said Jassim al Asadi, an environmentalist born in the marshes.
“The less water, the saltier it is,” Christophe Chauveau, a French veterinarian who surveyed the marshes for Agronomists and Veterinarians Without Borders said, adding that buffalos drink less and produce less milk when the water quality drops.