Televised images of starving children once again have brought the world's attention to the Horn of Africa, where three years of drought have pushed millions of the region's poor to the edge of survival. The answers to those questions are complex, and weave together meteorological conditions, changing economic development strategies, and a bloody war between Ethiopia and its closest neighbor.
Periodic drought seems to have been Ethiopia's lot for hundreds of years.
Yet droughts are becoming more frequent and severe. A century ago the country suffered a drought every 10-15 years. Today they come with alarming regularity every five years or less. While global climate change may have something to do with increasing the frequency and intensity of drought here, other factors have contributed to making Ethiopians more vulnerable to erratic or scarce rainfall. A high population growth rate, dwindling farm size, unjust patterns of land tenure, inefficient farming techniques, deforestation, and degraded soils all contribute to chronic disaster.