The socio-economic impacts

In the first blog posts, I looked at some of the changing conditions of Lake Tanganyika and the resulting environmental and social-economic problems. Today I want to look at the Lake Chad and its changing environmental conditions (as I explained last week) and their negative discourse.

It is written in the media that Africa is bearing the brunt of aridification as a result of climate change. But on the contrary, the “West” is producing the most significant quantities of greenhouse gases (Murray, 2007)

It's quite obvious that fishing conditions change due to the sinking of the lake but I wanted to see how they look like. 

I’ve watched a reportage about the consequences of a fisherman’s daily life due to the sinking water. It’s a film by the United Nations and it shows fishermen who noticed changes in the lake. The water level has fallen radically. There are 20 million people in the area who are seeing their way of life endangered. Furthermore, it’s said in the film that lake shrinking is being watched all over the planet, for example, lake Aral, which is also shrinking for decades.

In Lake Chad, many species are being vanished. Moreover, the lake is harder to work because the low water levels have led to the growth of thick vegetation. The harder fishing conditions which can lead to e.g. seagrass in the boat motor are only added complication to the lower number of fish. 

                                          Image of thick vegetation of Lake Chad

It’s not only the fishermen who are witnessing the strain but also the farmers. The consequences of the dry zone’s spreading are the loss of plants and animals that have kept people alive. The concern is that the people affected will suffer from hunger.

Other sources also point out that locals worry about not to have sufficient income to satisfy basic needs, such as food or water (Okpara et al,2016). Not all the fishermen have only specialised in one professional activity but have built up a further mainstay. Professions that are not based on water are becoming more and more important. Examples would be professions in such as “small trading in local markets, brick making, repairing of fishing nets and boats, and seasonal wage labour in nearby towns” (Okpara et al, p. 787, 2016).

In another reportage the same problems are explained. Villages that were directly next to the lake are now 50 kilometers away and that creates less and less work so thousands of young people are desperate and join the army as the only available source of income. You can see how some decisions are inevitably made.

The changing conditions of Lake Chad lead to that residents have to react flexibly. High adaptability is required. In some cases, this seems to work quite well, but still, it is not the solution to the problem. If the lake continues to shrink at this rate, the competition for other jobs will again increase.