Nov 26, 2020
Drought is a complex phenomenon. You can have an agricultural drought, for instance, even where there is no meteorological drought. That is, you can have adequate rainfall and still have crop failure. Or you can have hydrological drought, with marked depletion of rivers, streams, springs and fall in groundwater levels. The reasons for these are well known but seldom addressed. It is so much nicer to just put the whole thing down to nature's vagaries. It also works this way because so many forces, at different levels, are either integrated, or get co-opted, into the drought industry... The next year the same problems will crop up all over again because the real issues were never touched.
P Sainath, 'Everybody Loves a Good Drought'