Climate change is caused by the rich but mostly felt by the poor

[dArKeR]

British Prime Minister Tony Blair has declared that the two issues at the center of the G8 Summit this July will be African poverty and global climate change. These may seem to be distinct issues. In fact, they are linked. A trip I took to a village in the Tigre region in northern Ethiopia shows why.

One morning, I was taken to a dry riverbed at the village's edge. Farmers were digging a pit in the riverbed, down to the water table approximately two meters below ground level. They explained that until recently this was a perennial river -- one that flows throughout the year -- but now the river stops flowing during the dry season. Only when the annual rains begin in the summer does water reappear in the river bed. Until then, water-starved communities dig for water, if they can find it and if they can afford to pump it out.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/edit/archives/2005/03/07/2003225860