Lithuania is currently experiencing a severe drought and abnormal weather, which is causing poisonous dust to spread over the country's streets despite recent rainfall.
Toxic Dust in Lithuania
In certain areas of the country, the earth has turned to ash, while toxic dust has blown through the streets of Vilnius, the capital.
The grass is a burned golden color, and some of the trees' leaves are beginning to turn brown.
The small Baltic nation's Farmers' Union already projects that up to a third of its crops may fail, and summer has just begun.
With officials forbidding trips to several areas last week owing to the risk of wildfires, many more months of intense heat might yet be ahead.
Drought and Minimal Rain
A component of this intricate and varied environmental issue is low precipitation.
Only a few times have there been raindrops since April, with the most recent one occurring in the middle of May, according to Gytis Valaika of the Lithuanian Hydrometeorological Service.
She noted that although May rainfall is generally two inches, this year it was only a little over a half inch.
The worst scenario is in western Lithuania, where cattle and arable cultivation have long been practiced. Since early May, this region has been experiencing drought.
In their fields, many farmers do not have irrigation systems because they are typically not required.
According to Gabija Tamulaityt, an environmental specialist at the Baltic Environmental Forum Lithuania, this renders them particularly susceptible to intense heat.
Low Supply, High Prices
The likelihood of "more social problems" is increased because of the anticipated lower crop yields, which will raise food costs and keep them high throughout winter.
Given that food prices increased by 36% year over year in November of last year, Lithuania already has one of the highest rates of inflation in all of Europe.
The annual inflation rate for May 2023 was 11.7%. MapData Info claims that this also covers food and energy, +18.2% and 3.6%, respectively.
According to Yahoo News, this isn't the only issue.
Tamulaityt claims that dust polluted with "carbon particles" and "microplastics" is blowing through the air in areas where the earth is so dry, such as Vilnius.
Meanwhile, Alaccording to Valaika, it's bad for a person's breathing, lungs, and a lot of other things, and the situation will only become worse.
Abnormal Weather in Lithuania
According to Valaika, many frosts were observed in Lithuania throughout the spring. The month of May was also one of the sunniest months ever recorded, with 60 more hours of sunshine.
In addition to the drought, this unusual weather has had a "devastating" effect on several animal species since it is too dry for them to develop and reproduce.
Many animals, according to Valaika, cannot adapt to this type of weather and wildlife are finding it harder and harder to survive.
Global issues are to blame for the harsh weather in Lithuania, said EuroNews.Green.
According to Tamulaityt, Lithuanians first started talking about climate change twenty years ago. Nobody anticipated that it would have an impact on them; its effects were only thought to exist in theory.
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But the drought, in Valaika's opinion, is not unprecedented.
She explains that an even worse dry spell happened in the summer of 1994 when the nation had its highest-ever temperature of 99.5F and had even longer stretches without any rain.
More than half of the harvest that year was destroyed, which was a serious blow for a nation that had only recently gained its independence from the USSR and was going through a financial crisis.
Although she acknowledges the phenomena's consequences on her nation, Valaika claims that while it is currently fashionable to attribute everything to climate change, certain weather occurrences are not always caused by the phenomenon, EuroNews.Green reported.
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