Brussels, 31/03/2014 (Agence Europe) - It's not a fairytale. The extremely serious consequences of climate change are already making themselves felt; to differing degrees, they affect all continents and all oceans, and the nations are woefully underprepared, the climate science experts of 70 countries confirmed on Monday 31 March. However, they add, solutions exist to adapt to this scourge and minimise its impact. These experts call for proper adaptation to the future development of the climate, rather than reacting to past events, on the basis of three components of risk management, with risks due to vulnerability (lack of preparation) and exposure (people or assets in harm's way) overlapping with hazards (triggering climate events or trends).
Risks to agriculture, health, land and sea ecosystems, food and water supplies, threats to food security, threats of social tensions and conflict are among the serious dangers highlighted by the report of the working group II of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which was published in Yokohama on Monday morning. This assessment report looks at the impact of climate change, region by region and covering various sectors, from oceans to human safety, on the basis of various scenarios corresponding to an increase in the temperature of one degree Celsius (see EUROPE 11046).
Its publication 18 months ahead of the UN climate conference of Paris (COP 21, late 2015), where a legally binding global climate agreement is to be concluded for post-2020, sounds the alert. Connie Hedegaard, European Commissioner for Climate Action, seized the opportunity to call on all of the major economies to set ambitious objectives to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. “More knowledge is always good, more action would be even better. When the alarm goes off, many just hit the snooze button. This does not work any more when it comes to the climate. It's time to wake up and bring action to the scale needed. Europe is preparing an ambitious reduction target to 2030 to be adopted later this year [in October at the latest, according to the European Council]. I appeal to all major emitters to do the same urgently. It's time to get serious”, the commissioner commented.
Although the developing countries are the most vulnerable, “the likelihood of serious, extended and irreversible impacts increases as global warming intensifies”, state the experts, referring to vulnerable people, industries and ecosystems throughout the entire world. More fires, plant diseases and the proliferation of harmful insects in European forests, heatwaves, droughts and abundant rainfall in southern Europe are among the scourges referred to.
“The report published today underlined how the impact of climate change is affecting our forests, our seas, but also our daily lives, our health, our economy. In terms of policy-making, we shall not duck responsibility. While we need to act now and not in 10 years, many key EU policies are under threat from being weakened or even dismantled”, said Matthias Groote (S&D, Germany), who chairs the committee on the environment of the European Parliament. He pointed out that the Parliament is calling for three binding objectives for 2030 (at least 40% emissions reductions, a 30% share of renewable energy and 40% energy savings).
“This second part of the report is quite alarming: the consequences of climate change will change the world. The fundamental conditions of life for man will worsen, if we do not start to fight global warming seriously right now. Extreme weather conditions threaten our food security, sea levels are rising, oceans are drying out and biodiversity is under threat”, stressed MEP Rebecca Harms (Germany), vice-president of the Greens/EFA Group at the Parliament. She added that the governments of the member states of the EU and the European Commission have so far been unmoved. “The gap between scientists' observations and the lack of willingness to act as shown by European politicians is widening more and more”. The “scant climate objectives for 2030, currently being discussed [Ed: a reduction in emissions of at least 40% compared to 1990 figures and a European target of 27% for renewables] are not enough, it will take far more than this to halt climate change”, said the MEP, who described the policy of the heads of state and government of the EU as “irresponsible”. She argued that “it is only by means of genuinely ambitious and binding climate objectives for energy efficiency and renewable energies that we have a chance of keeping climate change to 2°C and preventing climate disaster”. (AN)