A Brief Colonial History Of Ceylon(SriLanka)
Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations
A Brief Colonial History Of Ceylon(SriLanka)
Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations
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Thiranjala Weerasinghe sj.- One Island Two Nations
?????????????????????????????????????????????????Tuesday, March 31, 2015
Surviving Climate Disaster In Africa's Sahel
For over 30 years the great Sahel Desert region in Africa has
been a harbinger of the coming climate disaster our planet is facing and
surviving such has become a national priority here in Eritrea on the
eastern end of the Sahel.
Remember Michael Jackson and the great Ethiopian drought and famine of
the early 1980’s? That was just the beginning. In 2003 and 2004 where in
Eritrea next door to Ethiopia suffered the first two year drought in
history, followed in 2008 and 2009 by another back to back drought.
Including the failure of the rains in 2013 Eritrea suffered 5 years of
drought in a single decade. This isn’t climate change, this is climate
disaster and science tells us that the world should be preparing for
even worse things to come.
Thanks to the mainly western countries contribution to rising CO2 levels
heating up the planet droughts will test the very ability of our
species to survive, something we here in Eritrea know all to well.
After the droughts of 2003 and 2004 the government here initiated a
major water conservation plan that along with reforestation and soil
conservation is a template for other countries to use to prepare for the
climate catastrophe being predicted.
What this means is that everywhere possible micro dams, dams and major
water reservoirs are being constructed to capture the rains that do fall
and use them to irrigate our fields, beginning to break the age old
dependence on rain fed agriculture.
Disastrous drought interrupted by record breaking floods is what is
being foretold by scientists and the only way to survive these man made
disasters is recognizing what needs to be done and then busting ass to
see it gets accomplished.
This may explain why Eritrea’s President is away from his office for
weeks at a time overseeing the construction of major water reservoirs
around the country. And all this hard work being lead from the very top
has paid off for when the rains failed in 2013 we here in Eritrea had
enough to eat while in much of the rest of the Sahel hundreds of
thousands starved to death.
thousands starved to death.
Water conservation is critical but so is reforestation and soil
conservation, for without trees to help absorb the water and hold the
soil in place and terraces to catch the soil the floods wash away our
water reservoirs will fill with silt and undo all our hard work.
As a result our school children spend a month every summer planting
trees and communities alongside the national service army regularly
schedule work days to build stone wall terraces to trap the soil run
off.
Colonialism and deforestation go hand in hand everywhere for forests are
the natural sanctuary for rebels fighting their colonial masters so
whether in Haiti or Eritrea cutting down trees became a weapon against
insurgency by our western colonializers.
When the Italians began to colonize Eritrea in the 1880’s over 30% of
our country was forested. By the time Eritrea won its independence on
the battle field in 1991 less then 2% of our forests remained. This man
made environmental holocaust left Eritrea very little in the way of
reserves to survive the CO2 driven climate disasters we have since faced
and forced our leaders to sacrifice a lot of other development projects
that would have raised the standard of living for our people in our
need to prepare for worse disasters to come.
Some years back the Eritrean President was ridiculed in the western
media for calling for ten years of grain reserves being kept in storage,
but today his plan is making all to much sense. Only time will tell if
all our hard work will be enough to prevent the worse climate disasters
foretold from wreaking havoc on this country but what choice do we have?
Hopefully Eritrea’s efforts will provide a role model for other
countries around the world and help prevent untold suffering by our
brothers and sisters internationally.
Thomas C. Mountain has been living and reporting from Eritrea since 2006.
He can be reached at thomascmountain at gmail dot com or when off in the field and away from the internet, which is much of the time, via mobile at 2917175665.
He can be reached at thomascmountain at gmail dot com or when off in the field and away from the internet, which is much of the time, via mobile at 2917175665.