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WATER POLITICS

Via National Geographic, dramatic satellite images from 1972 (left) and 2007 (right) which show the water-level decline in Lake Chad, once the world’s sixth largest but now one-tenth its former size due to declining rainfall and diversion of water for human use. While not yet a site of water conflict, given the lake’s location at the junction of Nigeria, Niger, Chad, and Cameroon, as well as its critical role in a generally water-scarce region, it is certainly a watershed to watch as millions of people in four Central African countries risk losing their primary water supply.