2006年VOA标准英语-Drought Ravages East Africa

By Cathy Majtenyi
Nairobi
07 February 2006

The drought ravaging¹ the East Africa area is having a severe impact on millions of people. Experts note a steady decrease in rainfall amounts, over the past few years, and say it will take a while to recover.

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Maasai cattle walk through an area stripped of vegetation, in the Amboseli national park in Kenya, January 4, 2006   
  

For at least three seasons now, Kenya's northeastern district, Wajir, has had a fraction of the rainfall that is normally deposited in the area.

To survive the rugged² arid³ and semi-arid conditions, herders usually move from place to place, taking their cows and other livestock⁴ to where there is water.

That is no longer the case. There is almost no water anywhere in Wajir.

Brendan Cox, spokesman with the Kenyan office of the British aid agency, Oxfam, describes to VOA what he witnessed during a recent trip to Wajir, where he says about 90 percent of the population depend on livestock farming for a living.

"The situation is really horrific there. The air is full of the stink⁵ of the dead and rotting animals. The borehole is surrounded by dead and dying cows and sheep and even camels," he described. "But also now, you're beginning to get humans dying, not in large numbers at the moment. The number of schoolchildren in the school had plummeted⁶ as people roam further in search of pasture for their animals. The remaining children who were still in the school couldn't concentrate because of the stink of the dead animals in the air."

Wajir, other districts of northern and eastern Kenya, southern Somalia and parts of Ethiopia fall within the worst affected⁷ areas of a drought that is ravaging East Africa.

 
A young goat herder in Niger 
  
According to the U.S. government's Famine Early Warning Systems Network, rainfall totals for the year in East Africa ranged from 20 to 60 percent of normal, with the March to May long rains virtually non-existent.

The effects of the drought are also being felt in Eritrea, Djibouti, Tanzania, Burundi, southern Sudan, Uganda and Rwanda.

Experts report that eastern Africa has experienced poor rains for six successive years.

Samuel Mwangi is senior meteorologist with the Kenya Meteorological Department. He explains that, in the highlands of East Africa, there can be more than 1,000 millimeters of rain a year, while arid and semi-arid places such as Wajir receive about 200 millimeters a year.

But, he says, in the season of short rains from October to December, only about seven millimeters fell in Wajir.

Mwangi says it will take awhile for the region to recover from the drought.

"If the rains came even today, you'd still need to even feed people who depend on agricultural products for quite some time until the crops mature," he said. "But, once the good rains come, the recovery is quite fast - in three, four, up to maybe six months. Then people would be back to their normal livelihoods⁸. But, in terms of building [live]stock, this takes a lot of time." 
  

The young are the most vulnerable to drought  
  
Rainfall is needed to revive pastoral lands and nurture⁹ crops.

Rainfall also recharges lakes, rivers, wetlands, forests and other dense¹⁰ natural vegetation, where water is stored and slowly released back into the air.

An expert in the U.N. Environment Program's Division of Early Warning and Assessment¹¹, Christian¹² Lambrechts, explains that heavy deforestation and other forms of degradation¹³ leads to the environment being less able to absorb the effects of droughts, making the droughts more severe.

Lambrechts says that, a century ago, about eight percent of Kenya's land was covered with forests; now, only 1.7 percent of forest lands remain.

"So, clearly, if we start playing with those ecosystems¹⁴, if we start basically diminishing our ability of helping¹⁵ coping with a dry season, clearly we are going to reduce the ability of those ecosystems to provide the normal services, and as such we might have a full collapse¹⁶ of everything which are depending on those services, which is what we are seeing now in northern Kenya," he said.

He says he has noticed similar patterns of degradation across East Africa.

The drought has resulted in failed crops, higher food prices, and a decrease in the quantity and quality of livestock.

Poverty is intensifying¹⁷. In the Bakool area of southern Somalia, some families are reported to be spending up to 80 percent of their income on water. People sometimes have to walk for hours to find water.

The United Nations' Food and Agricultural Organization estimates that 11 million people in the region are, in its words, "on the brink¹⁸ of starvation" because of the drought and non-weather-related factors, such as conflict.

1 ravaging   

毁坏( ravage的现在分词 )； 蹂躏； 劫掠； 抢劫

参考例句：

• It is believed that in fatigue there is a repeated process of ravaging the material. 据认为，在疲劳中，有一个使材料毁坏的重复过程。
• I was able to capture the lion that was ravaging through town. 我能逮住正在城里肆虐的那头狮子。

2 rugged   

adj.高低不平的，粗糙的，粗壮的，强健的

参考例句：

• Football players must be rugged.足球运动员必须健壮。
• The Rocky Mountains have rugged mountains and roads.落基山脉有崇山峻岭和崎岖不平的道路。

3 arid   

adj.干旱的；(土地)贫瘠的

参考例句：

• These trees will shield off arid winds and protect the fields.这些树能挡住旱风,保护农田。
• There are serious problems of land degradation in some arid zones.在一些干旱地带存在严重的土地退化问题。

4 livestock   

n.家畜，牲畜

参考例句：

• Both men and livestock are flourishing.人畜两旺。
• The heavy rains and flooding killed scores of livestock.暴雨和大水淹死了许多牲口。

5 stink   

vi.发出恶臭；糟透，招人厌恶；n.恶臭

参考例句：

• The stink of the rotten fish turned my stomach.腐烂的鱼臭味使我恶心。
• The room has awful stink.那个房间散发着难闻的臭气。

6 plummeted   

v.垂直落下，骤然跌落( plummet的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Share prices plummeted to an all-time low. 股票价格暴跌到历史最低点。
• A plane plummeted to earth. 一架飞机一头栽向地面。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 affected   

adj.不自然的，假装的

参考例句：

• She showed an affected interest in our subject.她假装对我们的课题感到兴趣。
• His manners are affected.他的态度不自然。

8 livelihoods   

生计，谋生之道( livelihood的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• First came the earliest individualistic pioneers who depended on hunting and fishing for their livelihoods. 走在最前面的是早期的个人主义先驱者，他们靠狩猎捕鱼为生。 来自英汉非文学 - 政府文件
• With little influence over policies, their traditional livelihoods are threatened. 因为马赛族人对政策的影响力太小，他们的传统生计受到了威胁。

9 nurture   

n.养育，照顾，教育；滋养，营养品；vt.养育，给与营养物，教养，扶持

参考例句：

• The tree grows well in his nurture.在他的培育下这棵树长得很好。
• The two sisters had received very different nurture.这俩个姊妹接受过极不同的教育。

10 dense   

a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的

参考例句：

• The general ambushed his troops in the dense woods. 将军把部队埋伏在浓密的树林里。
• The path was completely covered by the dense foliage. 小路被树叶厚厚地盖了一层。

11 assessment   

n.评价；评估；对财产的估价，被估定的金额

参考例句：

• This is a very perceptive assessment of the situation.这是一个对该情况的极富洞察力的评价。
• What is your assessment of the situation?你对时局的看法如何？

12 Christian   

adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒

参考例句：

• They always addressed each other by their Christian name.他们总是以教名互相称呼。
• His mother is a sincere Christian.他母亲是个虔诚的基督教徒。

13 degradation   

n.降级；低落；退化；陵削；降解；衰变

参考例句：

• There are serious problems of land degradation in some arid zones.在一些干旱地带存在严重的土地退化问题。
• Gambling is always coupled with degradation.赌博总是与堕落相联系。

14 ecosystems   

n.生态系统( ecosystem的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• There are highly sensitive and delicately balanced ecosystems in the forest. 森林里有高度敏感、灵敏平衡的各种生态系统。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Madagascar's ecosystems range from rainforest to semi-desert. 马达加斯加生态系统类型多样，从雨林到半荒漠等不一而足。 来自辞典例句

15 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

16 collapse   

vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷

参考例句：

• The country's economy is on the verge of collapse.国家的经济已到了崩溃的边缘。
• The engineer made a complete diagnosis of the bridge's collapse.工程师对桥的倒塌做了一次彻底的调查分析。

17 intensifying   

v.（使）增强， （使）加剧( intensify的现在分词 )；增辉

参考例句：

• The allies are intensifying their air campaign. 联军部队正加大他们的空战强度。 来自辞典例句
• The rest of the European powers were in a state of intensifying congestion. 其余的欧洲强国则处于越来越拥挤的状态。 来自英汉非文学 - 历史

18 brink   

n.(悬崖、河流等的)边缘，边沿

参考例句：

• The tree grew on the brink of the cliff.那棵树生长在峭壁的边缘。
• The two countries were poised on the brink of war.这两个国家处于交战的边缘。