Trickles instead of rivers, overheated lakes, parched fields: farmers are anticipating massive crop failures. A look at ignored warnings and drip-by-drip irrigation.

The images spreading these days are dramatic. Some of Europe's most important rivers have been reduced to mere trickles. The Rhine, for instance — the economic artery of the continent running through Germany, France and the Benelux states — is recording historically low water levels. Or the Loire in France, along whose banks famous châteaux stand: it has almost completely dried up.

According to the Joint Research Centre (JRC), a think tank of the Brussels-based EU Commission, 44 per cent of the area of the EU and Great Britain is at risk of extreme drought. A state of alert has been declared for nine per cent. This occurs when lack of precipitation, dry soil and abnormal plant growth coincide. Hot spots include Italy's Po Valley and parts of Spain, England and Portugal...

Read more at derstandard.at!