Impoverished Africa Shudders Under Global Warming
Pastor Dale Morgan
Impoverished Africa Shudders Under Global Warming *
70 percent of Africa's population -- who account for 90 percent of its
poor -- work and live in agriculture, more than 95 percent of which is
dependent on increasingly erratic seasonal rains, according to the
United Nations.
by Beatrice Debut
Nairobi (AFP) Nov 11, 2006
Already faced with recurring cycles of flood, drought and crop failures,
Africa and its 800 million people are on collision course with
devastation from unchecked global warming, experts say. The world's
poorest and least developed continent is also most at risk from climate
change, an ironic twist as it produces the least warming-causing
greenhouse gases of any of Earth's inhabited continents, they say.
As environmentalists, scientists and government negotiators from 189
nations meet here for a crucial UN climate change conference, threats to
Africa have taken the spotlight with urgent calls to avert looming disaster.
Global warming is not only hampering African efforts to deal with
endemic poverty and underdevelopment, they threaten to undermine them
completely, throwing Africa into a morass of misery, experts say.
"Poverty and climate change are inextricably linked," the relief agency
Christian Aid said in a report released ahead of the UN Framework
Convention on Climate Change in Nairobi.
"It is the poor of the world who are already suffering
disproportionately from the effects of global warming," it said.
And nowhere on the planet is more poor than Africa.
"Africa is the continent probably most vulnerable of all to the negative
effects of climate change and the one that faces the greatest challenges
to adapt," British-based charity Oxfam said in an October report.
This vulnerability is explained in part by the fact that 70 percent of
its population -- who account for 90 percent of its poor -- work and
live in agriculture, more than 95 percent of which is dependent on
increasingly erratic seasonal rains, according to the United Nations.
As such, global warming and its effect on weather patterns pose multiple
problems for Africans.
Central Kenya's once-fertile Mtitoandei region, for example, has been
largely without rain for the past 10 years, turning a lush greenbelt
into a virtual desert, killing agriculture and reducing the number of
farmers from 300 to two in just the span of a decade, according to Oxfam.
The effect may be pronounced in Kenya, host of the UN meeting, but it
goes well beyond east Africa, reducing production of staple foods and
grains and threatening the entire continent with catastrophe in the
coming decades.
"Cereal crop yields will decline by up to five percent by the 2080s ...
suffering climate-linked falls," the United Nations said on Sunday,
referring to staples in Ethiopia, Eritrea, the Gambia, Ghana, Sudan and
Zambia.
And, it said, unless action is taken to help Africa adapt to climate
change, some 480 million people in Africa may be facing water security
issues by 2025.
But food and water supply are just two of a plethora of worries.
Rising sea levels increasingly threaten Africa's Indian and Atlantic
Ocean coasts, from Dar es Salaam in the east to Lagos in the west, with
those at risk from coastal flooding rising from one million in 1990 to
70 million by 2080.
Global warming may also exacerbate the spread of killer diseases and
ailments, such as malaria and diarrhea, on the continent, according to
Christian Aid.
"185 million people in Sub-Saharan Africa alone could die of disease
directly attributable to climate change by the end of the century," it said.
On top of those dire warnings, the phenomenon could also stop and
reverse the limited development improvements Africa has already made,
experts say.
"Climate change restricts development in Africa," the World Wildlife
Fund said this week. "Climate change has the potential to undermine, and
even undo, improvements in the living standards of ordinary Africans."
Against this gloomy backdrop, the climate meeting in Kenya is looking at
ways to help Africa cope.
"Activating the adaptation agenda is critical," conference executive
secretary Yvo de Boer said, noting that Africa has a severe shortage of
weather and climate change tracking stations that could identify solutions.
Boosting their numbers could be one way to deal, but others are looking
to pull the continent up by increasing the number of so-called "Clean
Development Mechanism" (CDM) initiatives in Africa.
"Only nine of the almost 400 CDM projects so far registered under the
Kyoto Protocol are in Africa," according to the European Union that is
spearheading a drive for a more equitable distribution of the scheme.
Set up by the Kyoto Protocol that seeks to reduce developed nations'
greenhouse gas emissions, CDMs allow parties to the treaty and private
firms to buy emissions credits by funding development projects in poor
nations.
Source: Agence France-Presse