More than 5.5 million people in Southwest China's Guizhou province have been affected by droughts, rainstorms and hailstorms so far this year, local authorities announced Tuesday.

“The Godavari, Krishna and Cauvery rivers have experienced dramatic changes in flow due to the construction of dams, anthropogenic contamination and other activities, National Geophysical Research Institute (CSIR-NGRI) senior scientist Dr S. Masood Ahmad said here on Sunday.

“The Godavari would require significant intervention to protect its ecosystems and the people, who are mainly dependent on its river basins,” he added. (About 135 million people inhabit the river basins of the Godavari and Krishna.)

Even as drought persists in parts of Kenya's arid north, intense rains are claiming lives in other parts of the country – flooding slums in the capital Nairobi, sweeping away hikers in the Rift Val

Climate researchers said Thursday the planet could warm by more than 3.5 degrees Celsius, boosting the risk of drought, flood and rising seas.

Killer heat fueled by climate change could cause an additional 150,000 deaths this century in the biggest U.S.

China's capital will spend 118 million yuan ($18.66 million) by the end of the year to improve the quality of drinking water drawn from wells, the city's water resource management authorities said

Drought and disease have devastated life of coconut growers in the district. Rubbing salt into their wounds is the slump in price of copra and coconut.

Various diseases, including pest attack and stem bleeding, have ravaged crops on thousands of acres. Coconut trees in the rain-fed regions of Madhugiri, Pavagad, Sira and Koratagere have withered, leaving the distraught farmers in debt trap. The diseases have destroyed crop in and around 15 acres of plantation at Baragur in Chikkanayakanahalli taluk and scores of acres in Hosakere, Nittur, CS Pur hoblis in Gubbi taluk

The Central government has sanctioned Rs. 588 crore as drought relief for Maharashtra, which is reeling under the crisis, Relief and Rehabilitation Minister Patangrao Kadam announced on Tuesday.

The State whose 15 districts have been declared drought-affected, had appealed to the Centre for relief recently. Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan and representatives of all parties had met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh with a proposal for Rs. 2,700 crore.

Wars keep children out of school. So does sickness.