Ethiopia+Climate+Adaptation+Plan

Mason
Eastern Lebanon County High School Myerstown, Pennsylvania - USA

jbickel@elcosd.org or aweddle@elcosd.org

Ethiopia

**Our Plan**
Imagine a country that was bursting with life in all forms and brought the first signs of human life (“Ethiopian Artist Have…”). This country, today would have been considered a paradise, but is now a disaster. The country is Ethiopia. Ethiopia is a disaster due to drought, poverty, and starvation. These issues have devastated the country for many years. We as a country should and can help them.
 * Ethiopian Troubles

Ethiopia has not always been a third world country; they had advanced civilization during the first millennia. Their military was also powerful enough to take expeditions to South Arabia (EthiopianHistory.Com...). Coming into the 20th century Ethiopia was becoming a run down country. They had poor rulers, and as the 60’s and 70’s were approaching, poverty and starvation had already struck and now the biggest drought in African history approached. During this drought, millions of Africans died and many more are faced with starvation and poverty because it is still occurring.

As it is occurring, there are many disastrous problems that are resulting from the climate change threat. One of the problems Ethiopia is faced with due to drought is starvation. In 1985 nearly 8 million people faced starvation (Ethiopian Drought History…). They faced starvation because the drought caused most of the crops in Ethiopia to dry up due to lack of irrigation. The crops that do not need irrigation cannot grow either because of the rocky terrain. Now that the crops are drying out and dying, the livestock in Ethiopia are being underfed and sold very cheaply. The livestock and crops are their main source of income, so now that this is failing Ethiopia is lacking sufficient money. In order for the Ethiopians to solve their problem of water shortage they need to find a water source. The problem with finding one is you can’t drill, build dams, or other structures (“Faculty Helping Ethiopia…”). Starvation and poverty in this country is causing catastrophic effects. One of the major and most devastating effects is death. In October of 1984, over 1 million Ethiopians died (Ethiopian Drought History…). Just this fact alone shows that there are many deaths happening in a very short period of time. The people of Ethiopia are struggling to survive and fighting just to last through the night.

As they are struggling to survive, there have been some attempts to help. In 1990, The World Food Program (WFP) donated almost 8 million dollars in emergency food for Ethiopia (Ethiopian Drought History…). In 2009, the WFP also helped 10 million Ethiopians, and 6.2 million of those Ethiopians were given emergency food assistance (“Ethiopia.” WFP…). The United Nations sent 20,000 tons of wheat and 1,000 tons of vegetable oil to Ethiopia (Ethiopian Drought History…). Also, The United Nations International Children’s Fund (UNICEF), appealed for $7.7 million in January 2000 to meet immediate needs for clean water, medicines, nutritional supplements for children and pregnant women, and emergency education. Of this amount, UNICEF has received $500,000, as of the end of March 2000 (“Background.” Unicef. Web….). This sounds like a lot, but its effects were very minor to the people of Ethiopia. The attempts of organizations are helpful in a minor way but are not having a big enough effect. The effects are not impacting Ethiopia enough because organizations are focusing on giving them food and supplies and not on the problem of drought and how to solve it.

There is no easy answer to solving the drought, but it is possible. Desalination plants are a solution that can create water for Ethiopians to use for every day life. A desalination plant is a process that removes salt and other minerals from water to make it pure, clean, and drinkable. These plants have been set up in other countries and have had great success. For example, Saudi Arabia has the world’s largest desalination plant, which provides 70% of the country’s drinking water. Even though this is a great idea, the cost is highly expensive. The cost to put up one plant is about 3.8 billion dollars (“Saudi Arabia Opens…”). The United States alone cannot afford to set up a plant alone, but with the help of other annex 1 countries it is possible.

Annex 1 countries joining together could make a plan like this become a complete victory. The annex 1 countries such as: Australia, Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, European Union, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Monaco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russian Federation, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and The United States of America, could combine together to pay for the large fee of a desalination plant (List of Annex…) The money brought together would be used for supplies in building the plant. Then they would build roads to transport the water throughout Ethiopia. When roads are built they would buy trucks to transport the water to people all over Ethiopia. The annex 1 countries will donate and come together to attempt all of this.

The actions of the annex 1 countries will have many benefits for Ethiopians. One of the major benefits will be that the drought won’t be as devastating to the Ethiopians because they have water to drink and use in everyday life. Evidence that this can be successful is because of a place like Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia is using a desalination plant today and it is their main source of fresh water and is highly successful. Due to the available water use, another benefit will be that Ethiopia’s crops will be able to grow again. When the crops begin to grow again it will improve their poverty and starvation levels, because they will have food to eat and crops to sell. Their livestock will also be healthier, in which they can sell them for more money creating even more income and lowering the poverty level.

Besides all the advantages to the plan, the plan also is improved and better than any attempts done so far. One reason, is this plan does not affect any other area of Africa in a negative way. The plan is taking water from the area of Ethiopia and using the process to make it usable for the Ethiopians. It does not involve taking resources from other parts of Africa and affecting them in a bad way. Another advantage is that in other plans, such as: WFP, United Nations, and UNICEF, they were sending Ethiopia food but not trying to solve anything. This plan is finding a solution to the drought so the Ethiopians can make their own food and can be an independent country.

Ethiopia being an independent country is a huge success. This plan has the potential to be the best thing that has ever happened for Ethiopia because it is giving them their lives back. Ethiopians have been struggling with this drought for a long and harsh time. They are in poverty and starvation, and people are dying every day. This plan can solve all these problems. The desalination plant will give them their crops back, which will in turn provide them with food and a way to make money. This plan will be saving lives of millions of people.**