Too late? The effects of climate change are already upon us

The world is facing weather extremes, and it’s time for countries to act and adapt to the changes. Two events last week sent out similar messages.

Most of the debate on climate change has been on mitigation, or how to prevent further global warming by curbing emissions. But the spotlight should be on adaptation – how to cope with the effects of climate change. Because whatever we do to curb emissions (and not enough is being done), the effects are already upon us.

The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) released its report last week, aptly titled “The Global Climate 2001-2010: A Decade of Climate Extremes.” It reported that the decade was the warmest in the world for both land and ocean surface temperatures.

The report is full of information and data showing how the rate of increase in global warming between 1991-2000 and 2001-2010 was unprecedented. Every year of the decade except 2008 was among the 10 warmest years on record.

The average land and ocean surface temperature for 2001-2010 was estimated to be 14.47 degrees Celsius, or 0.47 degrees above the 1961–1990 global average and 0.21 degrees above the 1991–2000 global average.

The report also documented the recent effects that climate change have had, showing the crisis of adaptation is already with us.

First, there has been a rapid decline in Arctic sea ice and accelerating loss of net mass from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets and from the world’s glaciers. As a result, global mean sea levels rose about 3mm per year, about double the observed 20th century trend of 1.6mm per year. Global sea level averaged over the decade was about 20 cm higher than that of 1880.

Second is the increase in rainfall and floods. The 2001-2010 decade was the second wettest since 1901. Globally, 2010 was the wettest year since records were kept. Most parts of the world had above-normal precipitation during the decade. The eastern United States, northern and eastern Canada and many parts of Europe and central Asia were particularly wet. Floods were the most frequent extreme event of the decade. Eastern Europe was particularly affected in 2001 and 2005, India in 2005, Africa in 2008, Asia (notably Pakistan, where 2,000 people died and 20 million were affected) in 2010 and Australia, also in 2010.

Third, droughts occurred in all parts of the world. Among the worst hit were Australia (2002 and other years), East Africa (2004 and 2005) and the Amazon Basin (2010), with negative environmental impact.

Fourth, the decade saw 511 tropical cyclone-related events, which resulted in nearly 170,000 deaths. Over 250 million people were affected and economic damage worth US$380 billion was recorded.

Fifth, there was a tremendous increase of over 2,000 per cent in deaths from heatwaves, from less than 6,000 in 1991-2000 to 136,000 in 2001-2010. This was mainly due to heatwaves that hit Europe (2003) and Russia (2010).

Sixth, more than 370,000 people died in 2001-2010 due to extreme weather and climate conditions including heatwaves, cold spells, drought, storms and floods, according to data by the Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED). This was 20 per cent higher than 1991-2000.The average population exposed to flooding every year increased by 114 per cent globally between 1970 and 2010, a period in which the world’s population increased by 87 per cent from 3.7 billion to 6.9 billion. The number of people exposed to severe storms almost tripled in cyclone-prone areas, increasing by 192 percent in the same period.

Can all extreme weather events be attributed to climate change? Though there is no certainty, and each case has to be taken on its own, many scientists conclude that the likelihood of so many events was probably substantially increased by rising global temperatures.

I was in Beijing last week for an international conference on adaptation, organised by China’s National Development and Reform Commission with the British and Swiss aid agencies. We heard presentations by Chinese scientists and policy-makers on how climate change has been affecting local communities in several provinces in terms of rain, water supply, drought and rise in sea levels.

A four-year project run by the three agencies helped the development of scientific research, policy coordination among government agencies and the communities to adapt to climate change. This was in the area of facing up to water shortages, flooding, development of drought-resistant and flood-resistant crops, health and infrastructure to cope with flooding and other weather events.

Policy-makers and NGOs from other countries in Asia, Africa and Latin American also shared their adaptation experiences. Some, including Kenya, Mauritius and China, have prepared national adaptation plans, covering various regions and sectors in their countries.

Formulating a national adaptation strategy is already an achievement, as it requires scientific knowledge of local conditions in different regions in the country, projecting the effects of climate change under various scenarios, and mapping out solutions and costs. Given the WMO report of more extreme weather events to come, each country should prepare and try to get plans implemented.