Zimbabwe: Warming of Cities to Hit the Poor Hardest
Zimbabwean cities and towns are expected to become very hot in the next 25 years due to rapid urbanisation and deforestation, a new study has found. This could lead to a range of health and social complications including heat-stroke, water and energy shortage, experts warn.
Areas with day-time temperatures ranging between 36ºC and 46ºC will expand to cover about two thirds of urban areas while those averaging 18ºC to 30ºC decline, says the University of Zimbabwe study.
Heat-wise, that effectively means there will be more Karibas and Chiredzis than there are Gwerus or Nyangas -- and these changes will hit townships hardest, not so much for their endemic poverty as it were for their closely-knit type of settlements that suffocate green spaces.
CIFOR