Disastrous Drought

"Operation Drought," reads the sign on the Pan American Highway 55 miles northeast of Santiago, the capital of Chile. Soldiers have built a tent city there, and government technicians are drilling deep wells in search of water. A few miles up the road, schoolboys play soccer in the dried-out bed of the Aconcagua, normally a mighty river. Even farther to the north, water from the near-dry Recoleta Dam is rationed--four days running, ten days shut off.

Chile is gripped by the worst, longest drought in its history, a crisis so serious that President Eduardo Frei has declared it a "national catastrophe." The drought, now in its 20th month, followed three years of earthquakes, floods and destructive storms. The harried Frei has seen his drive for progress stalled by natural disaster after disaster, as well as by stubborn political opposition and splits in his ruling Christian Democrat Party. Says he: "The drought is worse than an earthquake. An earthquake produces panic, but reconstruction means work. A drought does not produce panic, but neither does it provide work."

Mere Trickles. The drought, caused by lack of rain and scant snowfall in the Andes watersheds, affects twelve of Chile's 25 provinces. In the nine most seriously stricken provinces, rivers are mere trickles, reservoirs are empty or almost so, and pastureland lies parched. Unfortunately, these are Chile's most populous and most productive areas: they normally provide 52% of the country's wheat and 88% of its beans--both basic Chilean foods.

There is a shortage of potatoes; two-thirds of the crop has been lost, as has nearly half of the corn and one-third of the rice. Nearly 700,000 sheep and about 300,000 head of cattle have perished. Losses in agriculture and livestock alone are estimated to have reached $180 million.

Not Alone. Frei's government has been trying its best to alleviate the suffering, but only at great cost to the economy. Deficit spending for drought relief has intensified Chile's inflation: the rate was 30% last year. Special government relief now goes to 60,000 people; in addition, some 60,000 are out of work, and that number may well double by next month. Foreign-exchange reserves are being whittled down by costly fuel-oil and coal imports that are necessary to make up for the loss of hydroelectric power.

Chile is not alone in its suffering.

Peru lost an estimated $40 million, chiefly in cotton, when drought struck six of its 24 departments early last year; it allocated another $10 million in relief and public-works projects to employ suffering campesinos. Ecuador saw parts of Manabi and Loja provinces charred, with an estimated $50 million in losses, mainly in coffee and rice. In Argentina's Patagonia region, woolmen estimate that the drought has taken the lives of at least 200,000 sheep. But Chile's plight is by far the worst of the nations in the area. If the drought there does not end soon, in fact, the Chilean weather bureau warns that the Atacama Desert, one of the world's driest, may begin advancing into the country's crop-rich central zone.

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