How is human activities linked with droughts?

Answer 1

Human activity can cause drought in a number of ways.

The biggest way is through deforestation. A large portion of rainfall originates from water that came directly from plants, through a process called transpiration. Plants draw water up from the soil and let it out through their leaves, much like evaporation, although the amount of water put forth is much greater. The plants use this as a cooling mechanism, just the way people sweat when they get too hot.

When people cut down forests, less water is able to be released into the atmosphere.

Another way human activities can cause drought is through the speeding up of runoff. Naturally, water runs slowly across land and seeps into the soil, where plants take it up and then it later goes into the air. Some of the water may also seep into underground aquifers where it can either be stored for years, or can be taken up by plants or by people through wells. However, when people pave over an area, or when they compact the soil in an area to build, the water runs off very quick, and doesn't seep in...instead it flows into a river and then into the ocean.

The net effect is that less water goes into the air, and with less moisture in the air, there is less rainfall, contributing to drought. The effect can be so strong that in some areas, you can take a tropical forest, cut it, and it will turn to desert, and the forest will not grow back at all.

Human activities can also prevent drought. By planting trees and allowing forests to regrow, and by protecting existing forests, people can help prevent the process of desertification (turning into deserts). Also, people can build holding ponds and artificial wetlands--this makes it so the water runs off from a parking lot, into the pond, where it sits and can slowly evaporate back into the air, and flow back into the water table.

Humans can have both a positive and negative effect on drought, depending on their actions!

I hope this helps!

Answer 2

Periods of drought can have significant environmental, economic and social consequences. The most common consequences are:

Wildfires (called Bushfires in Australia and New Zealand)
Ground drag and Desertification.
Loss of agricultural production
Disease
Thirst
Famine due to lack of water for irrigation
Social unrest
Migration or relocation of those impacted
War for water and foods.
The effect varies according to vulnerability. For example, subsistence farmers are more likely to migrate during drought because they do not have alternative food sources. Areas with populations that depend on subsistence farming as a major food source are more vulnerable to drought-triggered famine. Drought is rarely if ever the sole cause of famine; socio-political factors such as extreme widespread poverty play a major role.


Drought can also reduce water quality, because lower water flows reduce dilution of pollutants and increase contamination of remaining water sources in that

Answer 3

Constant cutting of forests. Once you cut a forest down, the ground composition changes and it will no longer support life.
Remember, at one time a squirrel could jump from tree to tree from the north pole all the way to the south pole........ who removed all of the trees.......................

Answer 4

illness & desperation...like they're going thru in Iraq at the moment !!

Answer 5

Why must we become more environmental?