Drylands making up one third of the world’s terrestrial surface are suffering extremely from the effects of climatic change, as everybody interested in the current discussion on global warming can easily imagine. What, however, is not so well known, is the fact, that land degradation in these regions works as driver for climatic change itself, thus creating a vicious circle.
When I first opened the book I was flipping through the 222 pages maybe subconsciously looking for those well-known striking photos of desiccation cracks, dead cattle, starving babies and sand dunes covering fields and crop - yet I did not discover a single photo. Ah, a real textbook! I thought… As we all know, “people don’t read anymore (books)”, instead they live on summaries and abstracts, excerpts and news feeds. I am no different. So, reluctantly I started to attack thetwo hundred pages…
The clear-cut layout and excellent English made the start easy. And then the miracle happened: I couldn’t stop reading. The “key messages” and projections neatly arranged in coloured boxes, hit me one after the other. A crime novel couldn’t deliver better suspense. I was intrigued by the meticulous research under way, the results of which you don’t even find in the best national papers. The many concrete case studies from countries around the globe were contributed by the Germandevelopment cooperation.
I learnt: adaptation and mitigation is the only chance left. I was dismayed by reading how far things have already developed beyond the point of no return. In the course of reading, those images – which I had missed when I first opened the book – re-appeared to my mind’s eye, all the thousands of images of degradation and suffering I have already seen in my life. This book, indeed, helps to look behind the well known images.
Yet, I am not at all confident that the necessary political actions for mitigation of the disastrous effects of climatic change in dryland countries will be undertaken by their ever so often duplicitous political class.