Human Development Report 2007/2008 Fighting climate change: Human solidarity in a divided world
The report provides evidence of the mechanisms through with the ecological impacts of climate change will be transmitted to the poor. Focusing on the 2.6 billion people surviving on less than US$2 a day, the authors warn forces unleashed by global warming could stall and then reverse progress built up over generations. Among the threats to human development identified by Fighting climate change:
- The breakdown of agricultural systems as a result of increased exposure to drought, rising temperatures, and more erratic rainfall, leaving up to 600 million more people facing malnutrition. Semi-arid areas of sub-Saharan Africa with some of the highest concentrations of poverty in the world face the danger of potential productivity losses of 26% by 2060.
- An additional 1.8 billion people facing water stress by 2080, with large areas of South Asia and northern China facing a grave ecological crisis as a result of glacial retreat and changed rainfall patterns.
- Displacement through flooding and tropical storm activity of up to 332 million people in coastal and low-lying areas. Over 70 million Bangladeshis, 22 million Vietnamese, and six million Egyptians could be affected by global warming-related flooding.
- Emerging health risks, with an additional population of up to 400 million people facing the risk of malaria.
See the UNDP video on the climate change
Years ago I was the government officer for a National Academy of Sciences workshop on the health effects of global climate change. I thought it was a real failure. There were a few epidemiologists who had studied the effects of heat waves in big cities in rich countries on the death rates, and who concluded that there was an increase. There were some vector biologists who suggested that the change in climate would change the range and density of disease vectors, and that as a result vector born diseases would become endemic or hyperendemic in new areas, raising public health threats.
I have been worried about threats such as those described above, which will fall especially heavily on the poorest of the poor -- people who have no surplus resources to provide a cushion in the case of crises. If you live on a dollar or two a day, and your land becomes a desert, or goes under water, or goes under a rising sea, your life is in danger!
It is especially ironic that those who contribute least to global warming are going to suffer most from its effects. The ethical implications for those of us in countries that are contributing the most greenhouse gas per capita, especially where we have allowed our governments to procrastinate on the creation and implementation of environmental programs, should be clear to all. We are ethically required to stop causing the problem to get worse, and start helping our poorest neighbors to deal with the mess we have created.
I have been worried about threats such as those described above, which will fall especially heavily on the poorest of the poor -- people who have no surplus resources to provide a cushion in the case of crises. If you live on a dollar or two a day, and your land becomes a desert, or goes under water, or goes under a rising sea, your life is in danger!
It is especially ironic that those who contribute least to global warming are going to suffer most from its effects. The ethical implications for those of us in countries that are contributing the most greenhouse gas per capita, especially where we have allowed our governments to procrastinate on the creation and implementation of environmental programs, should be clear to all. We are ethically required to stop causing the problem to get worse, and start helping our poorest neighbors to deal with the mess we have created.
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