Slash-And-Burn Agriculture Speeding The Melting Of Kilimanjaro

[hatrack]

MOUNT KILIMANJARO, Tanzania (CNN) -- "Fires set by farmers to clear land for crops are hastening glacial melting on Mount Kilimanjaro, and one scientist predicts that all snow will be gone from Africa's highest peak by 2020. The melting, a loss of about 300 cubic meters a month, is irreversible and will have devastating impact on the terrain and on tourism. Each year, about 10,000 tourists scale Kilimanjaro's famous peak.

Global warming makes the melting inevitable, but it would be slower if farmers stopped the burning which poses additional threats to the forests and ecosystem.

Those simple fires spread, indiscriminately setting off a series of events that lead to entire forests being reduced to ashes. And the forests are essential to the generation of rain. Less forest means less rain. Less rain means imminent drought and famine.

EDIT

Kilimanjaro's glacial rivers -- once bursting with mountain spring water -- have been reduced to babbling brooks because the glaciers that spawn these rivers are shrinking."

EDIT

http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/science/12/02/kilimanjaro.snow/