By Marta Di Donfrancesco
ROME (Reuters) – Sicily’s orange farmers warned on Tuesday that searing heat and drought risked wrecking this year’s production and called for help from regional and national authorities to save their business.
After months of below-average rainfall, a water shortage is affecting central areas of the Mediterranean island and hurting its orange cultivation, which accounts for 65% of Italy’s output of the fruit.
“Sicily is experiencing one of the worst seasons imaginable from a climatic point of view … the risk of desertification has now become concrete,” two associations of local orange growers said in a joint paper.
Agricultural production across Italy shrank last year as wine, fruit and olive oil output all took a hit from extreme weather events linked to climate change.
The paper called for urgent action to alleviate the impact of drought, such as upgrading Sicily’s dams and reservoirs, reducing leakage from water pipes and simpler procedures for farmers to locate and draw water independently.
Other demands included a refund of certain local fees paid by orange growers for services last year due to drought, discounts on electricity and diesel fuel bills, and a reform of the insurance system to offer increased cover for damaged crops.
The document will be presented to national and regional institutions charged with managing the water crisis which the associations said threatened “the survival of Sicilian citrus farming.”
(Reporting by Marta Di Donfrancesco; editing by Gavin Jones and Susan Fenton)
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