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REUTERS
SYDNEY
THE drought sweeping through large tracts of Australia is set to intensify over the next three months and is fuelling unseasonal winter bushfires, the leading meteorological agency and a fire official said on Thursday.
The Bureau of Meteorology forecast of more warm, dry weather suggests hopes for a reprieve from what farmers describe as the worst drought they have ever seen are unlikely to be realised before the Australian summer.
An unusually warm winter followed by what is expected to be a warmer-than-average spring"would mean intensification of the existing drought conditions across parts of eastern Australia", the bureau's outlook report said.
The report forecast below-average rainfall for large parts of Australia until November, the early part of the southern hemisphere summer.
Record-low rainfall in some regions and successive seasons of above-average temperatures have blighted vast tracts of Australia's grazing and crop land.
All of New South Wales, the country's most populous state that accounts for a quarter of Australia's agricultural output by value, is officially in drought.
Firefighters there were battling 81 grass and bushfires on Thursday, 38 of which remained uncontained, authorities said. While none of the fires posed threats to people or property, it was still an unusual event for the Australian winter.