The Deniliquin mill, the largest rice mill in the Southern Hemisphere, once processed enough grain to satisfy the daily needs of 20 million people. But six long years of drought have taken a toll, reducing Australia's rice crop by 98 percent and leading to the mothballing of the mill last December. [...]

The collapse of Australia's rice production is one of several factors contributing to a doubling of rice prices in the last three months — increases that have led the world's largest exporters to restrict exports severely, spurred panicked hoarding in Hong Kong and the Philippines, and set off violent protests in countries including Cameroon, Egypt, Ethiopia, Haiti, Indonesia, Italy, Ivory Coast, Mauritania, the Philippines, Thailand, Uzbekistan and Yemen.

Drought affects every agricultural industry based here, not just rice — from sheepherding, the other mainstay in this dusty land, to the cultivation of wine grapes, the fastest-growing crop here, with that expansion often coming at the expense of rice. [...[

While a link between short-term changes in weather and long-term climate change is not certain, the unusually severe drought is consistent with what climatologists predict will be a problem of increasing frequency.

Indeed, the chief executive of the National Farmers' Federation in Australia, Ben Fargher, says, "Climate change is potentially the biggest risk to Australian agriculture." [...]

For farmers in a richer nation like Australia the effects of the current drought are already significant.

The rice farmers who do not give up and sell their land or water rights are experimenting with varieties or techniques that require less water. Australia now has some of the world's highest rice yields for a given quantity of water.

Still, Australia's total rice capacity has declined by about a third because many farmers have permanently sold water rights, mostly for grape production. And production last year was far lower because of a severe shortage of water; rice farmers received one-eighth of the water they are usually promised by the government. [...]

Ranchers like Peter Milliken, who raises sheep on 37,500 acres near Hay, Australia, are trying to reduce the water they use. Milliken is installing a buried nine-mile pipe to replace an irrigation canal that lost up to 90 percent of its water to evaporation — and planning for the day when he does not irrigate at all.

Sheep farmers have already worked out cooperative arrangements to send flocks to whatever fields have recently received rain, sometimes herding or trucking them long distances. Keeping an eye on a flock, Frank Cox, a drover, said recently, "We had to move the sheep because they were dying of starvation, and truck them down here."

What wimps these Aussies are, eh? A few years of severe drought and they're ready to jump on Al Gore's global warming bandwagon. Show some gumption mates. My guess? God is simply punishing them for their lazy, hedonistic lifestyles. Put fewer shrimps on the barbie, and more butts in church pews and I'm sure this whole drought crisis would quickly be a thing of the past.

Don't you agree? I'm sure John Hagee does.