‘It was too hot, even to leave home’: stories from the world’s hottest year

Nigeria In the displacement camps of north-east Nigeria, most residents have the same answer for why 2.6 million people have been forced from their homes in this region. They are running from Boko Haram, the jihadist militants who still control significant parts of the Lake Chad basin. But ask about how Boko Haram gained momentum in the first place, and a more complex narrative emerges. The extremists capitalised on high levels of local poverty, alienation and unemployment in north-east Nigeria. And that in turn, many local residents argue, was fuelled – in part – by the shrinking of Lake Chad, and the desertification of the surrounding area. With global temperatures soaring ever higher, it’s a trend unlikely to be reversed any time soon. “It’s affected our livelihood, it’s affected farming and fishing,” says Mustapha Ali, a 50-year-old who grew up close to the lake’s former shores, and who is now living in a camp for internally displaced people. “We used to farm watermelon here, wheat, and rice – but because of the shrinkage of the lake, we can’t any more. Little by little it became harder and harder to [irrigate the] farm.” Since the 1970s, global warming has caused the… Read full this story

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