The long-running drought in eastern Syrian – and the upheaval it is causing – has so far received scant attention. The UN's World Food Programme says it has received less than half the $22m needed to support 300,000 vulnerable people this year. Consequently, 110,000 will not be given help and the WFP has warned of tens of thousands suffering from malnutrition.

A report in The National says:

Estimates vary but as many as a million people may have fled the land in Syria’s so-called Jazeera region as a result of three consecutive years of crippling drought. Some 160 villages have been abandoned entirely, researchers say, their residents moving to already over-populated urban centres in search of work. Squalid camps of rural migrants have sprung up on the outskirts of Damascus and other cities.

The UN reports that 40,000 families have left the once-lush farming areas, a number likely to amount to more than 300,000 individuals.

In addition, this year's Syrian wheat harvest is expected to be half the 2007 level, forcing the country to rely on imports when previously it was self-sufficient in wheat.

Posted by Brian Whitaker, 28 June 2010.