Sicily is burning due to extreme drought. Dams are drying up, farmers are forced to urgently slaughter their livestock, people are queuing with buckets for water. The situation is extraordinary, only the pools for tourists are full.
Dried lakes, burnt fields: Sicily suffers from an extremely severe water crisis. Droughts are not uncommon in Italy and the region, but the extreme drought, which has lasted for a whole year now, overshadows everything else. According to the local Civil Protection Office, 2024 is the year with the least rain in more than two decades, DPA reports. 70 percent of the island has been in an extreme drought for months, putting crops under threat, and in some places farmers are forced to urgently slaughter their animals because they are unable to provide them with fodder.
Dam left without a drop of water
Lago Fanaco - the lake that supplies water to the province of Agrigento on the southwest coast, contains up to 18 million cubic meters of water – when there are rains. But in April, the cubic meters were less than two million, and now the reservoir is almost completely dry. The archdiocese in the province urged the faithful to pray for rain that would take care of the fertility of the land and quench the thirst of the people.
Until this has an effect, however, the military must help. At the end of July, a tanker of the Italian Navy arrived on the island for the first time with 12 million liters of water for the most affected inhabitants of Sicily. One million people in the province of Agrigento live under severe water restrictions. On Friday in the town of Agrigento, people gathered for a protest march and called on the government to do something about the water crisis, WDR reports.
Tourists can rest easy
Despite the water crisis, tourists continue to flock to the beaches of southern Sicily and queue to see the remains of ancient Greek colonies. Hotels continue to fill their pools, while just a few kilometers away local people are forced to wait for water from tankers. Imposing restrictions on tourists would be “madness”, warns the president of the Sicilian Union of Hoteliers Nico Torrizi, informs WDR.
Structural problems in water supply
In May, the government in Rome declared a drought emergency and allocated 20 million euros for the purchase of tankers and for drilling in search of new water sources. The money is also intended for the modernization of the water supply system, as well as for the repair of the damaged aqueducts. “We are working hard, taking all the necessary measures to reduce the impact of the drought that has affected Sicily and many other Mediterranean regions,” said the president of the region, Renato Schiffani. However, more efforts were needed to solve the existing structural problems in the Sicilian water supply.
Scientists predict long dry spells
Climate changes are clearly visible. Temperatures in Sicily are currently two degrees higher than the average for the period 1991-2020, measurements show. From an up-to-date study by the “Max Planck“ it is clear that the probability of periods of extreme heat and drought, as now in Sicily, will grow steadily in the next two decades.
By the year 2050, there is a ten percent probability of reaching periods of very large droughts in two consecutive years. In addition, by the end of the century, five-year droughts will occur across Europe, WDR notes. A climate like in the Sahara, predicts the public media ARD in turn.