Global warming will hit world's poor: UN
Saturday, April 7, 2007
CLIMATE change is set to inflict damage in every continent, hitting poor countries hardest and threatening nearly a third of the world's species with extinction, UN experts warned yesterday.
Global warming will affect much of life on Earth this century, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said in a landmark report whose drafting was marked by an angry row.
Damage to Earth's weather systems from greenhouse gases will change rainfall patterns, punch up the power of storms and boost the risk of drought, flooding and stress on water supplies, the IPCC said.
This will have consequences that, according to the level of carbon pollution that stokes global warming, will be adverse or, in some scenarios, even catastrophic.
"Poor people are the most vulnerable and will be the worst hit by the impacts of climate change. This becomes a global responsibility," the IPCC's chairman, Rajendra Pachauri, declared.
Up to 30 per cent of animal and plant species will be vulnerable to extinction if global temperatures rise by 1.5-2.5 degrees Celsius, the IPCC said.
No continent can expect to be unscathed by even a relatively modest increase in temperatures.
"It is very likely that all regions will experience either declines in benefits or increases in costs for increases in temperature greater than two to three degrees"over 1990 levels, according to a "summary for policymakers" agreed by the IPCC.
Draft versions of this summary were fiercely disputed during a week of tense negotiations, ending with a marathon 24-hour session. Publication was delayed after the United States, China and Saudi Arabia objected to tough wording that sparked from one delegate a charge of political interference, sources said.
The summary accompanies a massive 1,400-page report which predicts that billions of people will face water scarcity and hundreds of millions will likely go hungry, mainly in the poorest regions least to blame for spewing the fossil fuel pollution that is driving up temperatures.
At US insistence, summary drafters dumped a paragraph that said North America was "expected to experience severe local economic damage and substantial ecosystem, social and cultural disruption", delegates said. Other changes were insisted upon by Saudi Arabia and China.
"But don't be misled," added a source, who clearly would have preferred that the stern warnings be left into the policy summary. "The data is all there in the main report — this is a very strong message." Poor tropical countries will be hit worst, according to a draft of the main report.
AFP
Global warming will affect much of life on Earth this century, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said in a landmark report whose drafting was marked by an angry row.
Damage to Earth's weather systems from greenhouse gases will change rainfall patterns, punch up the power of storms and boost the risk of drought, flooding and stress on water supplies, the IPCC said.
This will have consequences that, according to the level of carbon pollution that stokes global warming, will be adverse or, in some scenarios, even catastrophic.
"Poor people are the most vulnerable and will be the worst hit by the impacts of climate change. This becomes a global responsibility," the IPCC's chairman, Rajendra Pachauri, declared.
Up to 30 per cent of animal and plant species will be vulnerable to extinction if global temperatures rise by 1.5-2.5 degrees Celsius, the IPCC said.
No continent can expect to be unscathed by even a relatively modest increase in temperatures.
"It is very likely that all regions will experience either declines in benefits or increases in costs for increases in temperature greater than two to three degrees"over 1990 levels, according to a "summary for policymakers" agreed by the IPCC.
Draft versions of this summary were fiercely disputed during a week of tense negotiations, ending with a marathon 24-hour session. Publication was delayed after the United States, China and Saudi Arabia objected to tough wording that sparked from one delegate a charge of political interference, sources said.
The summary accompanies a massive 1,400-page report which predicts that billions of people will face water scarcity and hundreds of millions will likely go hungry, mainly in the poorest regions least to blame for spewing the fossil fuel pollution that is driving up temperatures.
At US insistence, summary drafters dumped a paragraph that said North America was "expected to experience severe local economic damage and substantial ecosystem, social and cultural disruption", delegates said. Other changes were insisted upon by Saudi Arabia and China.
"But don't be misled," added a source, who clearly would have preferred that the stern warnings be left into the policy summary. "The data is all there in the main report — this is a very strong message." Poor tropical countries will be hit worst, according to a draft of the main report.
AFP
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