European drought threatens harvest

Excessively hot and dry weather that has baked Europe for the past three months is threatening harvests and could lead to food shortages and price rises, experts have warned.

In the United Kingdom, the impact of five heat waves and long spells without rain could trigger the "worst food security crisis in decades", analysts from Shore Capital Markets investment bank predicted.

Italy, Europe's largest rice producer, has 3,500 rice farms at risk of drying up and producing nothing.

Failed harvests are likely to lead to greater reliance on imported food and price hikes.

In England, the government's environment agency said 71.3 percent of the nation is in the grip of a "flash drought" that developed despite healthy rainfall last winter, which filled lakes and reservoirs.

The National Farmers' Union of England and Wales, or NFU, described the situation as "increasingly concerning" and said dairy farmers are using animal feed set aside for the winter, because grass is not growing.

Paul Tompkins, deputy president of the NFU, told The Telegraph: "With no meaningful rain forecast in the coming weeks, the situation facing farmers and growers is increasingly concerning. Many farmers have completed the earliest harvest on record, with poor yields in key crops … growers are working hard to keep fruit and vegetables watered, but many are struggling to access the water they need."

The nonprofit think tank Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit said the UK's cereal and oilseed harvest could be down by 2.5 million metric tons as a result.

And in Italy, which has around 235,000 hectares of rice farms, extreme drought threatens to blight the harvest.

Franco Bullano, director of water management at the Est Sesia irrigation consortium, which supplies water to rice farmers, told Reuters, "This year, we had to introduce a rotation system." He said the system means different geographic areas get water on different weeks.

The low water levels across Europe led to widespread restrictions.

In France, nearly 70 percent of the country is now under some sort of water-use restriction.

AFP quoted France's Ministry of Ecological Transition as saying, "As France is experiencing a particularly severe drought, the effects of climate change continue to increase pressure on water resources."

France, like much of Western Europe, experienced its hottest month ever recorded in July, a month that was also the third-driest on record.

In parts of France with the highest level of restrictions, water can only be used for drinking, sanitation, healthcare, and civil protection, leaving farmers little hope that a large-scale irrigation program could save their threatened crops.

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