One of the world's most influential scientists has warned that climate change could devastate Africa, predicting an increase in catastrophic food shortages.

Professor Sir Gordon Conway, the outgoing chief scientist at the UK's Department for International Development, and former head of the philanthropic Rockefeller Foundation, argued in a new scientific paper (pdf) that the continent is already warming faster than the global average and that people living there can expect more intense droughts, floods and storm surges.

There will be less drinking water, diseases such as malaria will spread and the poorest will be hit the hardest as farmland is damaged in the coming century, Conway wrote.

Read the complete article here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/oct/28/africa-climate-change-...