Region of U.S. drought triples in size in one week

EP:  July 28, 2012 – MIDWEST – The U.S. Drought Monitor reported a nearly threefold increase in areas of extreme drought over the past week in the nine Midwestern states where three quarters of the country’s corn and soybean crops are produced. “That expansion of D3 or extreme conditions intensified quite rapidly and we went from 11.9 percent to 28.9 percent in just one week,” Brian Fuchs, a climatologist and Drought Monitor author, told AFP. “For myself, studying drought, that’s rapid. We’ve seen a lot of things developing with this drought that were unprecedented, especially the speed.” Almost two thirds of the continental United States are now suffering drought conditions, the largest area recorded since the Drought Monitor project started in 1999. “If you are following the grain prices here in the U.S., they are reflecting the anticipated shortages with a price increase,” Fuchs said. “It’s anticipated that this drought is going to persist through the next couple of months at least and conditions are not overly favorable to see any widespread improvement.” President Barack Obama’s administration has opened up protected US land to help farmers and ranchers hit by the drought and encouraged crop insurance companies to forgo charging interest for a month. Officials have said the drought will drive up food prices since 78 percent of US corn and 11 percent of soybean crops have been hit and the United States is the world’s biggest producer of those crops. The current drought has been compared to a 1988 crisis that cut production by 20 percent and cost the economy tens of billions of dollars. -Physics