It is easy to forget that climate change since the fifth century BC, when Sicily was the Bread Basket of the Mediterranean, and Sicily's rivers were navigable, to today's rather arid landscape. Today there are no navigable rivers; not even in a canoe.'  

I choose to ignore the Observer's Headline, because as often, The English Press chooses to Focus on a "sensational" but mere "sliver" of the Entire Story. 
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WORST DROUGHT IN MEMORY HITS SOUTHERN ITALY

The Guardian Unlimited Observer
Philip Willan
>From Palermo, Sicily 
Sunday August 18, 2002
 

A sign of skull-and-crossbones attached to a wire fence warns it is dangerous to swim in the lake, but the brackish water looks suited at most to paddling. 

A group of young people from Piana degli Albanesi formed a co-operative to offer rowing boats for hire, but they too have fallen victims to southern Italy's worst drought in half a century. Its seriousness is measured in the parched earth surrounding this shrunken reservoir in the mountains overlooking Palermo. 

Italy has been cut in half by extremes of weather - the North sharing the storms that devastated central Europe last week; the South gasping in unrelenting heat. 'This is Africa already,' said Giuseppe Sarrica, an unemployed barman out of regular work since he returned from Germany 20 years ago. 'It has rained very little over the last four years, but what is missing is not water, but good organisation. There's water underground; they just have to dig for it. People pay a lot for their water and someone is benefiting from the emergency.' 

Residents of Piana degli Albanesi are lucky; they have water piped into their homes every other day. In the capital, Palermo, it generally comes in every three days. In the worst-hit areas around Caltanissetta and Enna in central Sicily, or Agrigento in the South-West, supplies of water are piped once every two or three weeks. 

In Palermo, angry residents have blocked roads with refuse carts and clashed with police. Most people have responded like Sarrica, buying an extra large cistern and a pump to get the low-pressure water up to the top of the house. 

Brown patches scar the hills above Palermo, where forest fires have raged; in the countryside recent showers have added a timid flush of green to the summer hues of gold and grey.'This is the worst drought this area has ever seen,' said an official of the Drought Emergency Commission, who asked not to be named. 'Water reserves are at their lowest ever. They will last until the end of the year if they are carefully rationed.' 

The commission is preparing to cope with a crisis if the drought continues this autumn. The transport of water by ship, the construction of desalination plants and 'cloud-seeding' to create artificial rain are all under consideration. 

Lack of water has led to a war between town and country. Taps are dry in the cities because farmers have siphoned off water from aqueducts to feed their own illegal reservoirs. Dozens of water thieves have been arrested, and the Mafia has been offering water for sale, often drawn from illegal wells of uncertain purity, at extortionate prices. 

Last month, a man was arrested near Catania for diverting drinking water from a restaurant to supply his horses. To prevent the restaurant owner from noticing his loss, he allegedly pumped in non-drinking water from an industrial estate. And in the village of San Cipiriello someone stole the municipal water tanker. 

Massimo Finocchiaro, an expert working for the regional government, said: 'We have a semi-arid climate now, but during the war between Carthage and Syracuse, in the fifth century BC, Sicily's rivers were navigable. Today there are no navigable rivers; not even in a canoe.' 

Finocchiaro is convinced the crisis is man-made. Reservoirs built in the Fifties are capable of meeting the island's needs, he said, but there has been no unified management and 40 per cent of the water leaks from the antiquated distribution system. 'There are more than 450 bodies responsible for managing water resources, and of the 50 artificial reservoirs, 44 are not functioning at full capacity,' he said. A reservoir in the Belice valley has not been used for 40 years because it still awaits safety clearance. 

'Most dams are in earth, so they have to be kept fairly full or they crack,' Finocchiaro said. Because of dams not being allowed to operate at full capacity, seven million cubic metres of water were released into the sea last winter. Illegal wells have transferred pollution from shallow underground sources to lower level reserves of drinking water. 

Finocchiaro said local politicians had transformed access to water from a right into a privilege, consolidating their hold on power.

Guardian Unlimited Observer | Special reports | ...while, in Sicily, the Mafia sells water 
http://www.observer.co.uk/europe/story/0,11363,776579,00.html