The world is ‘greening’ at an astonishing and rapidly growing rate and deserts are shrinking almost everywhere you look. All due, it seems, to a natural rise in carbon ‘plant food’ dioxide, not forgetting the small annual 4% portion contributed by humans burning hydrocarbons. Inconvenient to the political Net Zero narrative of course – along with high numbers of polar bears, cyclical recovery in Arctic sea ice and recent record growth of coral on the Great Barrier Reef – so there is naturally little mention in mainstream media and politics. “Desertification is turning the Earth barren,” reports the Guardian, and the expansion of drylands is leaving entire countries “facing famine”. Great story, shame about the facts. A recent article in Yale Environment 360 states that rather than shrivelling and dying, vegetation is growing faster and deserts are retreating.
