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Nick Perry / AP
John Rose stands in a field on his dairy farm in New Zealand on Thursday. A drought on the country's North Island is costing farmers millions of dollars each day and is beginning to take a toll on the country's economy.
Authorities in Wellington, New Zealand, have issued an outright ban on outdoor water use as a worsening drought has siphoned the available supply to less than half of normal level and prompted the government to declare the worst water shortage in 30 years.
New Zealand's capital, home to more than 200,000 people, has just 19 days' supply of water left in its reservoirs, the APNZ news service reported.
"The water supply situation is now approaching extreme," the Greater Wellington Regional Council said in a statement on its website, adding that it is also asking residents to cut indoor water use "to help us avoid a crisis."
Wellington hasn't seen a significant rain since Feb. 4, and while a storm is forecast for this weekend, it will have no real impact on the water supply, authorities said. All of the North Island, which holds most of the country's population, has been declared a drought zone. Auckland on Thursday issued an outdoor fire ban.
The Wellington City Council said urgent action had to be taken to ensure that homes and businesses had sufficient water.
"Water levels in our local rivers -- the source of our water supply -- are extremely low and dropping," the council said in a statement. "A significant reduction in demand for water will extend the number of days that back-up storage will last, so it’s important to save water now."
The drought has had a major impact on farmers, who estimate that it has so far cost them $820 million in lost export earnings, The Associated Press reported, adding that the damage is rising daily as they reduce their herds, which in turn reduces milk production.
"We are beginning to see a decline in milk production -- in fact, a sharp decline in some areas -- and farmers are considering slaughtering capital stock, which will result in lower future production and reduced revenue," New Zealand Finance Minister Bill English said Tuesday during a Parliament meeting.
Brett Phibbs / AP
Fields are turning from their normal green to a dry and crunchy brown as the drought worsens.
"It's very hard to remember when the last rainfall was," dairy farmer John Rose told the AP, adding that he had sent more than 100 of his cows to slaughter in recent weeks as the drought turned pastures brown and dry. He said the move was necessary to make sure his remaining 550 cows had enough to eat -- a challenge even as he mixes in palm kernels with their feed to try to stretch it.
Like most farmers, he's concerned about the future, as are some government officials.
"We know the drought will peg back growth in the economy, but it is not yet clear by how much," English told Parliament.
Even if the current drought eases soon, the long-term picture isn't rosy, according to climate scientists.
The government's National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research predicts that farmers in the southern part of the North Island, the area around Wellington, will spend up to 10 percent more time per year in drought by the middle of the century.
More NBC News coverage of New Zealand
Leave a Comment:
Kely, you're just another scammer...
The death of editing.
So 30 years ago when CO2 levels were below the self declared safe level of 350 ppm, what was the cause of the drought then?
I guess it is just magic. If CO2 was below 350 ppm everything was normal and natural no matter how severe it was.
Now with CO2 above 350 ppm, everything is man made and worse. Even if it really isn't worse than it was in the past, back when it was natural.
Bad weather will always happen its the frequency of it happening that is the issue. Calling this due to climate change may be a stretch but if droughts begin to occur more regularly then its time to take a closer look.
North Island drought worst in history
How many of these stories need to crop up every month before people see what's happening?
February marked the 336th consecutive month that global temperatures rose above the 20th century average.
One has to go back to 1985 to find an 'average' month. Do you think we might have a trend going on here?
Also this may be the worst drought in NZ for 30 years but it is also the longest stretch without rain since records began,
We need more people on this planet. Let's just go all in to see how fast things can devolve.
Sorry to read this. I have dear friends in New Zealand and they were talking about this issue a month ago. Their rivers are so low that algae is growing and the fish are stressed. We have traveled to this country several times and they are very concerned about climate change, clean air and the water. This is a beautiful land with wonderful people, I'm concerned for them.
The S.I isn't much better off. I have family on both islands and I skyped last week with my cousin on the S.I. She said things are really bad there, even more so on the N.I. She and her husband are looking forward to coming here in July; we are looking forward to going there in November.
NZ is normally an absolutely gorgeous, green country. I can't imagine it as brown as Joanne was describing to me last week. They have a small sheep ranch and some race horses. Right now they are OK with the size of their stock but larger farmers, their friends, are really suffering. And I guess the flies are just horrendous this year. I saw several buzzing around as we talked.
I hope they get some rain very soon...........
I have been to NZ. It is a paradise. Here in Texas we are having a horrible drought, too. I hope it will rain soon in NZ. Texas is a hell anyway, may it dry up and blow away.
Photogal, Why are they coming over? There's going to be a drought here as well.
New Zealand has had draughts in 2008, 2010, 2011 and now in 2013. They mentioned the 2008 draught as the worst in 30 years. So how can the 2013 draught be the worst in 30 years?
Some very bad reporting.
I hope they can get trough this without losing many of theire animals. The finacial toll can be devastating.
that means 2013 draught is worse than 2008 draught, nullifying the 2008 claim then, which was also correct at that time coz you could not predict the future.... duhh....
by the same token they may have 2016 draught that is also worst in 30 years and you gonna complain that too??? omg...
The drought in 2008 would be the worst from 1978 to 2008. The drought in 2013 would be the worst from 1983 to 2013. If the 2013 drought is worse than the 2008 drought, that fact remains the same.
Honestly this is not hard.
I came here looking for people to blame it on global warming without any scientific data to directly relate to it and ignoring the fact that droughts & floods happen naturally. I leave without being disappointed.
Drought! Flood! Cold up north! Hot down south! Tornado in tornado alley! Earthquakes in California! Ice melting once a year @ the poles! OMG GLOBAL WARMING!
Seriously, global warming may be real, but blaming EVERYTHING on it and overexagerating is nuts. Just wait til we have another ice age or have another supervolcano dim the sun globally for years. This new generation is the worst at recycling in history. Let's go back to glass bottles for milk & sodas, stop killing trees for paper bags, keep using oil by-products in plastic bags rather than dispose of it without use, fine people for not using recycle bins (mine consistantly has more in it than the garbage bin), etc. I have no problem with that. But damn, stop blaming every little thing in nature on global warming. Didn't you ever learn the moral of Chicken Little? "Racism!", "OMG global warming!", "sexism!", etc, etc...nobody is going to believe it when irrefutable instances of it happen.
Global warming's no fun.
It may not be raining but there is still water in the air.
Terry Lebleu created a Drought Master system that extracts water from the air even in a drought.
Ten thousand years worth of data says that New Zealand will have moderate weather, drought, or flooding every year. Fortunately, the flooding and the droughts are more like decade occurrences. Why doesn't the media inform the people of the scientific facts. The earth's climate is constantly changing and has been doing so for 4.5 billion years. There are cycles of warming, cooling, and moderation. The concept of average temperature or rainfall is STUPID without presenting the distribution and the standard deviation. Heck, Chicago probably has an average temperature of 0 degrees if you include a million years of data.
According to all the scientists who cried 'global warming', the warmer climate was supposed to cause more torrential rainfall events and subsequent humidification of continents, causing even more 'global warming'. It does seem they have missed their forecast on this, since the southern US is also still in a drought and has been for a number of years.
No. It means that patterns are changing, and novel ones may emerge at least in human experience. Please try to catch up. Thanks.
There's plenty of water in the high mountain snow of the South Island of New Zealand. All they need to
do is figure out a way to transport it to the North Island.
New Zealand’s glaciers have, on average, receded by about 1.3 kilometres (nearly 1 mile) in just 13 years, Bruce.
We don't even have to rely on models anymore, because the changes are happening so fast that we can actually see them. It's time to face reality - weather patterns are changing. Ice is melting. Water comes in torrents, or not at all.
You want to pump water from SNZ to NNZ? I find that to be astounding.
New Zealand is an ally of jihadists and a wretched place to practice Medicine. I hope they get rain soon, though, as they are also insignificant. (Their America's Cup Team is sponsored by the Emirates, and their antisemitism is well known, including banning Kosher meats).
I left New Zealand in 2007, to move to Minnesota. I have plenty of water on my property, with GREEN, GREEN lawns and free water to water my lawns. It was a crap place to practice Medicine, as they are 20 years behind modern in my specialty. They felt they were modern. They were WRONG. And arrogant.
I think I'm taking a 30 minute shower tonight.
Minnesota is supposed to have 10,000 lakes. Why don't you go jump in one of them, Scott A.?
Iceland, Norway, Sweden--are they antisemitic, too? Those countries, along with New Zealand, have outlawed kosher slaughtering (not kosher meat) as an inhumane practice which causes great and unnecessary suffering to the animal--which it is and does.
Halal meat fulfills all the requirements for being kosher except, obviously, there is no rabbi to supervise. I would accept that compromise in exchange for living in an idyllic place where physical fitness is universal and no one has a gun.
Scott..MD?? (Mildly deficient)..What on earth are you dribbling on about? If you left NZ for the States..then all I can say is NZ gain USA loss...And if you are a doctor..after reading your comments I would not take a sick dog to you, let alone a person. I am having an hour long shower tonight and I live across the ditch..to translate for you (The Tasman Sea) still confused..Australia....
Hi Shona
Perhaps Madly Deficient
How have you been?