Hit by drought, Brazilian cattle farmers struggle to adapt

DW (English)

Brazil is reeling from one of the worst droughts in its history. DW visited one cattle breeder in the northeastern state of Bahia to see how the lack of rain has affected his ranch, and the steps he must take to keep his animals alive.

Transcript

00:00These cows are not supposed to look like this, emaciated, with their ribs showing.

00:10They are the victims of one of Brazil's worst droughts in living memory.

00:15Here in the northeastern state of Bahia, farmers are worried about the extreme weather and

00:20its impact on their herds.

00:24The cattle suffered a lot.

00:26What we mean by that is that they lost weight.

00:29They felt the drought.

00:30The drought was noticeable in a different way.

00:34This year was not typical.

00:36They lost a lot of weight.

00:40The lack of rain affected the pasture on Cleber Diniza's ranch.

00:44That in turn impacted the quality of feed that the cows need to thrive.

00:50Cleber feared some of the cows would not survive because of the lack of proper nutrition.

00:58The worry is exactly that.

01:00The cows become weak, lay down and die.

01:04Despite the challenge, Cleber has managed to get through the year without losing any

01:09cattle.

01:10But he realised, in order to avoid deaths during the next inevitable crisis, he needed

01:16to take action, now.

01:20This involves creating as much food for the herd as possible, by growing more crops, especially

01:26corn.

01:27But to do this, he needs to irrigate larger areas of his farm.

01:34And that costs money.

01:37A lot depends on financial resources.

01:42If you have irrigation, then you are able to control the amount of water.

01:48So if, for example, it does not rain, then you can still guarantee the corn harvest.

01:54So we are spending money on irrigation, and that is not cheap.

02:00Providing food during a drought looks likely to gobble up a large part of the budget of

02:05small farmers like Cleber for years to come.

02:09But facing down climate change is no mean feat.

02:12And Cleber says it's only by taking the right steps at the right time that he'll have a

02:17chance of keeping his herd alive and healthy.

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