Johnny and I went down a rabbit hole to understand Saudi Arabia’s massive farms.
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Just south of the Saudi Arabian town of Tubarjal, there’s an expanse of farmland that stretches to the horizon and beyond. It’s a baffling 3,000 square kilometers of lush green fields, densely packed into a grid-like pattern. And it’s right in the middle of one of the biggest deserts in the world.
Johnny found this place on Google Earth while preparing for a field shoot in Saudi Arabia, and called me with a question: What are these fields doing in the middle of the desert? And how did this country manage to grow so many crops in such an inhospitable environment? Finding the answer took us on a journey through 40 years of drastic change in the desert kingdom.
You can check out the video Johnny made in Saudi Arabia here: https://youtu.be/UGzI-ABpy6k
Here’s some of Fred Pearce’s writing on Saudi agriculture: https://www.salon.com/2012/06/10/will_the_middle_east_starve/
Read the Water Resources Research article on global groundwater depletion: https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/2015WR017349
Mohammad Suhail’s research on Saudi Arabia’s water: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/10/4189
Check out the FAO’s interactive chart tool: https://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#compare
And read Nathan Halverson’s great piece on What California can learn from Saudi Arabia: https://revealnews.org/article/what-california-can-learn-from-saudi-arabias-water-mystery/
Hello and welcome! Tunnel Vision is a new independent video news show that dives deep into mysteries from all corners of the internet. With a commitment to transparency, we pull back the curtain on the journalistic process, emphasizing the journey of discovery rather than simply presenting the final answer.
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About:
Christophe Haubursin is a journalist and video creator. Before launching Tunnel Vision he worked at Vox.com for 8 years, where he made videos for Vox’s YouTube channel, hosted the show Glad You Asked, and produced on the Netflix series Explained. He lives in Brooklyn.
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Twitter: / haubursin
— CHAPTER TITLES —
00:00 – 01:18 | Intro
01:19 – 6:05 | The research begins
06:06 – 09:40 | Where the water comes from
09:40 – 11:25 | Seeing the circles
11:26 – 13:51 | Why fields are turning brown
13:52 – 16:31 | What comes next?
