Climate Change: Droughts and Increasing Desertification in the Middle East, with Special Reference to Iraq

Abstract

Climate change impacts on Earth's atmosphere have caused drastic changes in the environment of most regions of the world. The Middle East region ranks among the worst affected of these regions. This has taken forms of increasing atmospheric temperatures, intensive heat waves, decreased and erratic precipitation and general decline in water resources; all leading to frequent and longer droughts, desertification and giving rise to intensive and recurrent (SDS). The present conditions have led to increasing emissions of (GHG) in the earth atmosphere. All future projections especially those using (IPCC) models and emission scenarios indicate that the Middle East will undergo appreciable decrease in winter precipitation with increasing temperature until the end of this century both of which are inductive to increased dryness and desertification. Iraq as one of the countries of this region and due to its geographical location, its dependence mostly on surface water resources originating from neighboring countries, long years of neglect and bad land management put it in the most precarious and unstable position among the other countries of the region. Modelling studies have shown that Iraq is suffering now from excessive dryness and droughts, increasing loss of vegetation cover areas, increasing encroachment of sand dunes on agricultural lands, in addition to severe and frequent (SDS). These negative repercussions and their mitigations require solutions not on the local level alone but collective cooperation and work from all the countries of the region.

Investigation of observed dust trends over the Middle East region in NASA GEOS Earth system model simulations

“…Although aerosol emissions from anthropogenic sources have increased over some regions, Klingmüller et al (2016) showed that changes in AOD in the same period were accompanied by decreases in the MODIS Angstrom exponent and so decreases in the AERONET fine mode particles, which suggests that the AOD trends over the region is associated to higher concentration of coarse particles, like dust. Increases in soil dryness due the land use and higher temperatures have also been linked to the observed AOD trends (Adamo et al, 2022). Changes in the vegetation cover shows reduction of vegetation in the region of the Crescent Fertile as seen in Fig.…”

Cooling of a PVT System Using an Underground Heat Exchanger: An Experimental Study

“…In the past 20 years, the country has been subjected to severe drought and a dearth of rainfall, which has significantly increased desertification . This situation made the city prone to many frequent dust storms and the rise of dust continued throughout the years …”

“…61 This situation made the city prone to many frequent dust storms and the rise of dust continued throughout the years. 62 Baghdad Governorate is in the middle of the alluvial flood plain of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. This region also receives high solar radiation intensity, like all regions close to the sun belt.…”

Global Actions on Climate Change: The Health System Focus – A Systematic Review

“…On the other hand, Iraq's climate varies between the rising temperatures and changes in rain patterns which led to a recurrence drought, desertification, and the sandstorms [40][41][42][43][44]. Such climate change poses serious health risks, including heat stress, foodborne illness, waterborne diseases, respiratory diseases, and malnutrition [41].…”