The Negev Desert will spread to the north, the quality of the pastures will decrease and cattle may suffer

Dr. Marcelo Sternberg, at a conference on global warming: "Grandiose plans, such as the Canal of the Seas and the connection of the Red Sea to the Dead Sea, may create natural disasters" Poll: Israelis are willing to pay an additional tax to preserve green landscapes * The findings will be presented today at a conference in Tel Aviv

A long series of changes in the vegetation and also in the animal world is expected to take place in Israel, following the threatening predictions regarding global warming. "The scenario we are building is based on the data provided by meteorological models. These indicate an increase in aridity in Israel," says Dr. Marcelo Sternberg, from the Department of Plant Sciences in the Faculty of Life Sciences at Tel Aviv University.

At the scientists' conference on global warming, held this week by the School of Environmental Studies at Tel Aviv University, Dr. Sternberg will present the ecological and biological aspects resulting from the expected climate changes - and consequently also the predicted change in land use in Israel and around the world.

The scientific conference, under the title "Global warming - is our future in danger?", is organized by the Porter School of Environmental Studies at Tel Aviv University and the Association of Friends of the University. The winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Prof. Paul Krutzen from the Max Planck Institute in Germany, will be the main guest alongside renowned scientists and researchers from Israel and the world who will participate in the conference. The discussions will be held on Thursday, December 14, in the Britannia Building on the Tel Aviv University campus, in Ramat Aviv.

Prof. Yehuda Benyaho, head of the School of Environmental Studies, points out the place of the School of Environmental Studies, since its establishment in 2000, as the first and only academic center for multidisciplinary research and teaching on environmental issues in Israel. "Prof. Crutzen's visit as part of the conference will greatly contribute to strengthening and the central academic status of the school," added Prof. Benyahu.

According to Dr. Sternberg, special attention must be paid to the consequences that global warming will have on the natural systems - plants and animals - that provide goods and services to man. "We must examine their ability to withstand changes so that we can continue to enjoy their jobs in the future. If their natural habitats change - we will pay dearly for it," Sternberg added.

"The first signs of what is to be expected in nature are already visible - and it is assumed that we will see much more of them in the future", he noted. "Then we will see a strong movement towards the north, and a little towards the west of the country, of natural systems that are characteristic of the arid and semi-arid regions. In other words: the spread and expansion of desert areas will begin. We will see an abundance of plants typical of the desert region, and they will appear in areas where they were not before. The rate of change in the conditions of the habitats as a result of the predicted reduction in the amount of rain will be faster than the rate of evolutionary processes, which usually last thousands of years, and occur when plants go through processes of acclimatization and self-adjustment (adaptation), to new conditions. We therefore anticipate an increase in the extinction process, which will take place in various plant species, due to their inability to adapt to the new climate conditions and the disappearance of habitats. Different species will simply disappear - or their abundance will decrease to a significant extent."

All of these have direct consequences especially on the natural grazing areas for cattle. "Reduce the biomass of plants and pastures in them. The pastures will be reduced. Cattle herds are expected to be affected mainly. They simply won't have enough food - and that has significant economic consequences for beef cattle breeders. Sheep and goats can graze in desert areas, but not herds of cows."

A decrease in the amount of rain, the scientists warn, could damage wheat crops (leaf crops). Dr. Sternberg: "The forecast is for damage mainly in the north of the Negev, the area of ​​Kibbutz Lahav and Kiryat Malachi, for example, which is a transition zone between the desert and the Mediterranean climate in Israel. This is a particularly sensitive area. If it receives, for example, 300 mm of rain on average per year - then a reduction of 100 mm, due to global warming, is proportionally very serious and has much more severe consequences than a reduction of the same 100 mm in the northern region of the country, where for example The average amount is currently about 800 mm. For this reason we say that such transition zones will be affected first. Above them hovers the greatest threat."

In addition to the climate changes, which are expected to cause the disappearance of various plant species - their extinction or a significant reduction in their density and abundance, is also expected as a result of the urbanization processes, and changes in land use and designation. "There is certainly a mutual interaction and synergy between the dangers arising from global warming and the urban development processes, which cause severe disruption in the habitats of plants and animals in the wild," emphasizes Dr. Sternberg. Among the species that should be expected to be damaged in the country, he lists mainly the geophytes, that is, the plants with the bulb or the onion, such as yellow lilies, irises and daffodil species.

"A study carried out by my colleague, Prof. Yoram Yom-Tov from Tel Aviv University, noted Dr. Sternberg, revealed, for example, that among songbirds in Israel there is a trend of decreasing body weight as well as distribution. We think that these are signs of a new type, among those affected in the animal world due to the warming process that is integrated into the trend of cutting and direct damage to their natural habitats. There was simply a severe lack of food for them. We have already seen damage to amphibians - for example salamanders - due to the decrease in rainfall and the increase in aridity. Another research work now being done at Tel Aviv University implies a fear for the fate of donkeys, due to these changes. These unique animals were in serious danger of extinction. Individuals that survived were returned to nature in order to save them and try to renew their population - and now a new threat is hovering over them again."

According to him, if the rains decrease, as a result of global warming in addition to changes in land use (development and construction processes) - the percolation capacity of the rainwater to refill underground reservoirs (aquifers, groundwater reservoirs) will be adversely affected and the quality of this water will also change. "The changes in the soil will lead to more erosion and runoff of rainwater that will flow into the sea and be lost - instead of percolating naturally and refilling the reservoirs. On our coastline there is already a tremendous pressure of continuous construction, which is done right above the coastal aquifer - one of the two aquifers (the other - the mountain aquifer) that we depend on and the ability to seep and fill the reservoirs is simply blocked."

"We know today that man has contributed to global warming due to industrial gas emissions into the atmosphere. It also caused the pollution of streams and water bodies. Grandiose plans such as the Red Sea - Dead Sea Canal may create additional natural disasters. Already now, because of the Suez Canal that was opened for ship traffic only 137 years ago, we see in the Mediterranean sea species of fish that originate in the Red Sea and even from more southern waters that have violently taken over our coastal areas, pushed the local species out of them, causing a decrease in variety and diversity. The connection between the two aforementioned rivers could cause an ecological disaster of enormous proportions and kill the Dead Sea twice: once because the flow of Jordan water had already decreased to it, due to the Degania and Yarmouch dams. The Jordan has not been a river for a long time and can hardly even be considered a stream today. And the second time - because the mixing of two types of water with different levels of acidity may create, instead of an already small and very dry lake, a huge surface of plaster and also the color of the water that will be left, will change to red, an irreversible situation, due to the development and accelerated activity of bacteria."

A new study carried out by Dr. Sternberg, in collaboration with Dr. Aliza Fleischer (Agricultural Economics, Faculty of Agriculture of the Hebrew University in Rehovot), the details of which were published in the last issue (October 2006) of the journal "Ecological Economics" (Economics of Ecology) - reveals a fact Surprising: A survey conducted among a representative sample of the Israeli population revealed that there is a willingness to pay, and even quite a bit, in order to preserve green landscapes in the country. And this is in order not to let the climate changes and development processes deteriorate the natural landscape in Israel to an extreme extent. "There is a willingness, for example, for additional taxation on fuel, on electricity consumption, increasing the price of road tolls and taxation on cars - in a total amount estimated at 80 million dollars per year - if this money is dedicated specifically to preserving the landscape. And this is definitely an encouraging finding."