What problem is Lake Chad facing?

What problem is Lake Chad facing?

Climate change: A looming peril Its population is exploding and the region has been ripped apart from conflict at an unprecedented scale. The ever-changing climate has dramatically worsened the situation, amplifying food and nutritional insecurity in the region.

What is the Chad Basin crisis?

What is the Lake Chad Crisis? The Lake Chad Basin is the site of a large-scale, complex and protracted humanitarian emergency. Factors contributing to the crisis include conflict, rapid population growth and severe vulnerability caused by the effects of climate change, environmental degradation and poverty.

What are the objectives of Lake Chad basin Commission?

The objective of the LCBC is the sustainable and equitable management of Lake Chad and other shared water resources, the preservation of ecosystems, the promotion of integrating and preserving of peace and transboundary security in the Lake Chad Basin.

What are some environmental issues in Chad?

The three chief damaging environmental issues in Chad is desertification, the lack of fresh water, and the locust swarms.

What are the effects of Lake Chad shrinking?

The 30 million people living in the Lake Chad region compete over water, and the drying up of the lake could lead to migration and conflicts, according to FAO. Fish production has recorded a 60 percent decline, while pasturelands have been degraded, resulting in a shortage of animal feed, livestock and biodiversity.

What has happened to Lake Chad?

Lake Chad has shrunk considerably since the 1960s, when its shoreline had an elevation of about 286 metres (938 ft) above sea level and it had an area of more than 26,000 square kilometres (10,000 sq mi), making its surface the fourth largest in Africa.

Which country do not belong to the Lake Chad basin Commission?

Algeria has not participated. The other countries with observer status are Egypt—in the neighboring Nile Basin—and the Republic of Congo and the Democratic Republic of Congo which are fed by the Ubangi River being considered for diversion into Lake Chad.

Who owns Lake Chad?

Lake Chad’s declining water level has been on the political agenda of the Sahel region since the 1960s. The water is shared by Niger, Nigeria, Chad and Cameroon though it also affects communities in the larger regional spread of the basin that includes Libya, Algeria, Sudan and the Central African Republic.

Why is the Lake Chad shrinking?

Lake Chad, in the Sahel region of Africa (and once the sixth largest lake in the world) has shrunk by 90% over the last 40 years, primarily due to increased agricultural and municipal water withdrawals, but also due in-part to climate change and persistent droughts (Gao et al., 2011) .

How does the climate affect Chad?

Climate change exacerbates weather variability, meaning droughts and floods are increasing. No country is immune to climate change, but a country’s preparedness – or lack thereof – will determine its level of vulnerability during climate-related extreme weather events. Chad’s geography makes it particularly fragile.

What are the causes of Lake Chad shrinkage?

Dams and irrigation. The UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Lake Chad Basin Commission (LCBC), a regional body that regulates the use of the basin’s water and other natural resources, maintain that inefficient damming and irrigation methods on the part of the countries bordering the lake are partly responsible for its shrinkage.

What is it like to live in Lake Chad?

As you approach the Lake Chad basin from Maiduguri, in northeastern Nigeria, the atmosphere of despair is telling. The air is dusty, the wind is fierce and unrelenting, the plants are wilting and the earth is turning into sand dunes. The sparse vegetation is occasionally broken by withered trees and shrubs.

How can we replenish Lake Chad?

The commission’s member countries have plans to replenish the lake by building a dam and 60 miles of canals to pump water uphill from the Congo River to the Chari River and then on to Lake Chad. The replenishment project “will be the first of its kind in Africa,” says Martin Gbafolo, the LCBC’s director of water resources and environment.

What is the LCBC and who is involved?

The LCBC — established by the leaders of Chad, Nigeria, Cameroon and Niger in 1964 and later joined by the Central Africa Republic in 1994 — and its partners continue to make efforts to save the lake or at least mitigate the impact of its shrinkage on people’s lives.