QUILLOTA, Chile, Apr 30 (IPS) - For the rural farmers in Chile, a combination of climate change-induced mega droughts, water policies that make access unaffordable and a State that either doesn’t want to or dares not intervene in the water market means family enterprises are dying out.Lack of water threatens the very existence of family farming in Chile, forcing farmers to adopt new techniques or to leave their land.
CUZCO, Peru, Dec 18 (IPS) - Before, when it didn t rain in the summertime, we children used to pray to God to send us water from the heavens, and the rain would come. But now it s different; the climate has changed and no prayers work Juan Hilario Quispe, president of the small farming community of Muñapata
"The rich world has caused the climate change that is drying up our water sources, and here we are doing everything we can to recover them because otherwise we will die," said Juan Hilario Quispe, president of the small farming community of Muñapata, just over 50 kilometers from the Peruvian city of Cuzco.
LIMA, Oct 26 (IPS) - The lack of water is so severe in Peru s highlands that farming families are forced to sell their livestock because they cannot feed them. "There is no grass or fodder to feed them," says Fermina Quispe, a Quechua farmer from a rural community located at 4,200 meters above sea level.
SANTA MARÃA OSTUMA, El Salvador, Oct 10 (IPS) - The effects of El Niño on agriculture in Central America are once again putting pressure on thousands of small farmer families who are feeling more vulnerable economically and in terms of food, as they lose their crops, due to climate change.