The UN’s latest report, titled ‘The Humanitarian Implications of Climate Change’, identifies India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Indonesia as global warming hotspot nations that are particularly vulnerable to an increase in extreme natural disasters

India will be vulnerable to extreme drought, floods and cyclones in the coming decades, says the latest United Nations report that examines possible consequences of global warming within the next 20-30 years.

The report, titled ‘The Humanitarian Implications of Climate Change’, identifies India, along with Pakistan, Afghanistan and Indonesia, as ‘global warming hotspot nations that are particularly vulnerable to an increase in extreme natural disasters’.

These countries are already facing considerable political, social, demographic, economic and security obstacles, adds the report.

Commissioned by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and CARE International, the report says: ‘Climate change is blurring the distinction between natural and man-made hazards. Weather-related disasters would occur anyway, but severe events such as drought, floods and storms are growing more frequent and more intense -- and the consensus among experts is that we are to blame.’

In 2005-2006, natural disasters killed 120,000 people, affected 271 million people and cost US$ 250 billion. Areas of greatest risk in the next 20-30 years are Africa, particularly the northern Sahel, the Horn of Africa and central Africa; central and south Asia, particularly the belt from Iran and Afghanistan through Pakistan, India and the Caspian region; and Southeast Asia, especially Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia and Indonesia, says the report.

Climate change coordinator for CARE International Charles Ehrhart, one of the authors of the report, says: “Climate change will greatly complicate and could undermine efforts to manage these challenges.”

The impact of a natural disaster is determined by several factors such as access to proper equipment and information as well as the ability to exert political influence, he said. “The striking lack of these explains why poor people, especially those in marginalised social groups like pastorates in Africa, women and children, constitute the vast majority of disaster victims.”

The authors express the hope that pointing out hotspots around the world will spur leaders to take action and encourage aid workers to modify their strategies to take into account the realities of new risks posed by climate change.

According to the report, the most effective means to curb human vulnerability to disasters are boosting the ability of local and government institutions to respond to crises, empowering local people to have a stronger say in disaster preparedness, response, recovery and rehabilitation, and providing services and social protection for the most vulnerable populations.

The report also asks governments to take urgent action to ensure that weather-related hazards, which are becoming more intense and frequent due to climate change, do not lead to a corresponding increase in disasters.

The launch of the report in Geneva coincides with a gathering of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change that kicked off last week in Accra, Ghana. The seven-day event is the latest round of UN-sponsored global climate change negotiations ahead of a major summit set for 2009 in Copenhagen, Denmark.

The Accra meeting of 1,600 delegates and environmentalists from 160 countries is working on a plan to encourage developing countries to regulate carbon emissions by focusing on their largest industries.

How to get developing countries to commit to reducing pollution levels has deeply divided the world seeking to craft a new climate change agreement to succeed the 1997 Kyoto Protocol that expires in 2012.

The so-called “sectoral approach” sidesteps objections from countries like India and China, which refuse to accept national targets for overall emissions of the greenhouse gases blamed for global warming.

Under the approach now taking shape, developing countries will set pollution targets for specific industries like cement production, steel and aluminium. Unlike the industrial countries, they are likely not to be punished for missing their targets.

“Something quiet but quite dramatic is happening,” says David Doniger of the Natural Resources Defence Council. “People are now talking about the same idea in the same language.”

China and India have voiced reservations, but have not rejected the concept.

“There is now a basis for discussion on the issue,” says Katrin Gutmann, policy coordinator of the WWF Global Climate Initiative. “Before, we worried there would just be more clashes.”

Consensus appears to coalesce around the idea that industrial countries will remain legally bound to meet a national cap on their carbon emissions, while developing countries will have flexibility in deciding which industries would be controlled and at what levels.

Advanced countries will also provide the technology and funding to help other countries curb emissions from heavily polluting industries.

Source: PTI, August 22, 2008
           Associated Press, August 22, 2008
           International Herald Tribune, August 22, 2008
           http://ochaonline.un.org, August 2008