South Africa is facing a massive drought one of the worst in the past two decades. On Friday the South African government gave a media briefing on the conditions of the drought in the country.

The briefing detailed that “South Africa is a water scarce country and ranks as one of the 30 driest countries in the world with an average rainfall of about 40% less than the annual world average rainfall.”

They continued to state that the extreme heat-wave currently on-going is due to the El-Nino which has made the already harsh conditions in the country worse. The government explained that the water resources in South Africa are being stretched across the whole of the country. This has meant that many areas have already implemented water restrictions.

In the briefing they announced that they predicted “El Nino phenomenon to continue at least until March 2016, which means that the current hot and dry conditions are likely to persist for the next six months.”