BRAZIL is suffering its worst drought in over seven decades, with more than half of the country hit, it was reported today.

Around 59 per cent of the country is suffering from the historic drought.

Major Amazon basin rivers are registering historic low flows, and uncontrolled man-made wildfires have ravaged protected areas and spread smoke over a vast expanse, leading to deteriorating air quality.

“This is the first time that a drought has covered all the way from the north to the country’s south-east,” Ana Paula Cunha, a researcher at the National Centre for Monitoring and Early Warning of Natural Disasters, said in a statement issued last Thursday. 

She added: “It is the most intense and widespread drought in history.”

Smoke on Monday afternoon caused Sao Paulo, a city of 21 million people, to breathe the second most polluted air in the world after Lahore, Pakistan, according to data gathered by IQAir, a Swiss air technology company.

Around 683 miles to the north, a wildfire is sweeping through Chapada dos Veadeiros National Park, one of Brazil’s most famous tourism sites.

Head of the park Nayara Stacheski said: “This year, the dry season started much earlier than in previous years, whereas the rain season was intense yet short.

“The wind is strong, the air humidity is very low and it’s extremely hot. All this worsens the wildfire.”

On Monday, there was one uncontrolled wildfire in a remote area. Another fire was controlled by 80 firefighters, with support from two aircraft. Two other fires were threatening to spread to the park.

Pantanal, the world’s largest wetland area, has recorded the second worst fire year on record.

So far this year, an area the size of Italy has burned in Brazil.

More than 1,200 miles from Chapada dos Veadeiros to the north-east, the Amazon river and one of its main tributaries, the Madeira river, have registered new daily record lows at the city of Tabatinga. 

Low river levels have stranded dozens of communities only accessible by water. One of the largest is Filadelfia, inhabited by 387 families of the Tikuna tribe. 

Due to the drought, children are drinking dirty water, leading to a surge in illnesses and food is becoming scarce as crops die, local leader Myrian Tikuna told reporters.

She said: “This used to be the Amazon River. Now it’s a desert. If things get worse, our people will disappear. Now we are realising the severity of climate change.”