Sand and dust storms affect the health and livelihoods of millions of people across the world. The two worst affected regions are North Africa and West Asia, including the Arabian Peninsula and Middle East.
How do they come about?
Sand and dust storms have many causes: the degradation of land and ecosystems, soil erosion, drought, the unsustainable use of land and water resources, urbanization and climate change are the major drivers. Such triggers can reduce the cohesiveness of the soil, strip the ground of its cover, or cause a drop in soil moisture. So when the wind blows it kicks up huge amounts of dust into the atmosphere.
Over-grazing by animals, over-working of farm areas, poor use of water, land clearing, and a failure to replant cleared land can also contribute to the problem.
What is their impact?
Dust storms adversely affect air quality. The World Health Organization estimates that 6.5 million people die every year from breathing dirty air. Fine particles of dust can travel thousands of miles on the back of these storms. They may also carry pathogens and harmful substances, causing acute and chronic respiratory problems.
The storms have an economic impact, forcing airports and schools to close, interrupting supply chains, destroying crops and causing road accidents.
They can last a few hours or several days. In the Middle East and North Africa, about $13 billion in Gross Domestic Product is lost every year due to dust storms.
Sand and dust storms also exacerbate the loss of land productivity, ecosystem integrity, and biodiversity. In the Middle East, this vicious cycle can displace populations and destroy critical habitats and wetlands.
However, the picture may be more complex. One recent study, Dust–wind interactions can intensify aerosol pollution over eastern China, suggests dust can, in fact, have a positive effect on air quality: Less dust means more solar radiation hits the land surface, which reduces wind speed. That lack of wind, in turn, leads to an accumulation of air pollution, for example, over heavily populated parts of China.
Are the storms becoming more frequent?
According to climate models developed by UN Environment and the World Meteorological Organization, dust storms are predicted to get worse.
“The frequency and intensity of dust storms have increased in the last 30 years, and are expected to get worse in the next 50,” says UN Environment ecosystems management expert Diane Klaimi, citing reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, among others.
Much of Iraq’s fertile land has been literally blown away as desertification intensifies.
“Within the next 10 years, Iraq could witness 300 dust events per year,” says Klaimi.
The Government of Iraq, with support from UN Environment and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, is in the process of developing a national programme to combat sand and dust storms.
What can be done?
To address root causes, there is a need to better understand the relationship between the storms, climate change and land degradation.
Because of the close links between ecosystems and landscapes across the West Asia region, countries in the region need to cooperate to tackle the problem.
The area of Al Hammad, which is shared between Iraq, Syria and Jordan, is thought to be the largest source of dust. Western Iran and eastern Iraq are also major sources. No single country can solve the problem alone, since there are multiple sources and pathways.
“There is a critical global need to better understand the drivers of sand and dust storms, improve predictive capabilities, and collaborate on developing integrated solutions, such as better land and water management in source areas,” says Klaimi.
“Region-wide monitoring and early warning systems can contribute to reducing dust hazards on health and the economy.”
On average, 12 million hectares of land is lost due to desertification and land degradation every year.
Ambassador Peter Thomson, President of the UN General Assembly, recently stressed that achieving “land degradation neutrality” can accelerate progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals. Speaking at an event in New York on 1 May, he said that more than half of the world’s agricultural land is affected by soil degradation.
“The lives and livelihoods of more than one billion people are currently under threat, with soil loss, erosion, contamination and degradation affecting food security, health, and sustainable local economic opportunities,” he added.
“Land degradation disproportionately impacts the poorest and most vulnerable communities. It is imperative we do something to reverse the trend,” says UN Environment expert Mohamed Sessay.
Read our 2016 story on sand and dust storms.
UNCCD press release: UN launches campaign to invest in degraded lands to create jobs, boost incomes and food security
For more information: Diane Klaimi: Diane.Klaimi [at] unep.org
Media enquiries: unepnewsdesk [at] unep.org
