The Muslim News - Climate change is killing Africa…and we are to blame

Issue 213, Friday 26 January 2007 - 6 Muharram 1428

Climate change is killing Africa…and we are to blame

By Sajeda Qureshi

A unique new coalition of UK aid agencies and environmental organisations ‘Africa, Up In Smoke 2’ published a report in October stating that unless urgent measures are taken to tackle climate change it will become one of the biggest killers of Africans, and make the Millennium Development goals (international targets on halving global poverty by 2015) unobtainable. Friends of the Earth Executive Director, Tony Jupiter, has said that “Climate change is overwhelming the situation in Africa...unless we take genuine steps now to reduce our emissions, people in the developed world will be condemning millions to hunger, starvation and death.”
The report updates previous research from the organisations - Oxfam, the New Economics Foundation and the Working Group on Climate Change and Development, an umbrella group of aid and green groups. The coalition of organisations warns that “act now on climate change or human development gains will go Up in Smoke”. These organisations have come together to bring much needed attention to the result of global warming on the world’s poorest communities in the hope of bringing about a global solution to this monumental problem. The report states that one of the challenges faced by humanity is to decide “How to design a new model for human progress and development that is climate proof…and gives everyone a fair share of the natural resources on which we all depend.”
Despite an already erratic climate over Africa the report states that scientific research “indicates new and dangerous extremes.” Further droughts in the continent will make it increasingly more difficult for Africans to grow food and rely on food security, making it more difficult to end poverty in the region. For example, there would be a huge loss in animal habitat on the continent and it would become increasingly difficult for plants to survive. The report also points out that the average number of food emergencies in Africa per year almost tripled since the mid 1980s.
Andrew Simms from the New Economics Foundation (the publishers of the report) has said that, “Global warming is set to make many of the problems which Africa already deals with, much, much worse. In the last year alone, 25 million people in Sub-Saharan Africa have faced food crisis. Global warming means that many dry areas are going to get drier and wet areas are going to get wetter. They are going to be caught between the devil of drought and the deep blue seas of floods.”
We are already seeing evidence of the disastrous consequences of climate change in the form of recent floods in Somalia, Kenya and Ethiopia that hit over 1.8 million people in November. These floods follow the severe droughts that affected the horn of Africa last year. The floods have reportedly killed hundreds of people and displaced hundreds of thousands from their lands, including 80,000 refugees from the conflict in Somalia who were living in refugee camps in Kenya. Local governments have appealed for international help and the UN has said that the floods are the worst in the region for over 50 years. Helping this region, especially Somalia, has been made more difficult by continued heavy rainfall which has washed out roads and destroyed bridges. Farmland has also been destroyed which will make it harder for natives to recover from the floods once the water has receded. We cannot now continue to ignore that the threat of global warming to Africa is real, and that it has already started claiming the lives and livelihoods of the poorest communities on the continent.
The climate change report estimates that cities such as Cape Town, Lagos and Alexandria will be at risk of severe flooding by 2080 and that the rising sea levels could potentially place 30% of Africa’s coastal settlements under water, displacing millions of peoples and animals, and causing the disappearance of some species of animals altogether.
The report concludes that the African continent is on average 0.5 centigrade warmer than it was 100 years ago, but in areas such as Kenya it has become 3.5 centigrade warmer in the past twenty years alone. These may seem like small numbers, but in the context of global warming, they can spell disaster for Africa. It is ironic that Africa should suffer at the effects of global warming, despite being one of the regions least likely to pollute in comparison to richer, industrial countries such as America or Britain. Achim Steiner, the executive director of the UN Environment Programme has said that, “Africa has made the lowest contribution to climate change. It is also the least prepared to cope with the consequences...and has the most to lose.”
The report expresses concern that climate unpredictability will make subsistence farming more difficult, resulting in a decline of crops such as millet and maize. It predicts that the most damaging impact of global warming will be on agriculture; the main source of income for nearly 75% of Africans and which accounts for 55% of the Africa’s exports. Up In Smoke 2 condemns the failure of industrialised governments which have done little to help developing countries to adapt to climate change, despite having knowledge of practices that could help reduce the result of global warming. The report recommends that “In the face of global warming new models of development and nature conservation will be needed that are climate proof and climate friendly…from now on planners must view all development decisions through the lens of risk reduction. Crucially, communities at risk must be at the centre of this planning process if it is to succeed.”
The report recommends that between $10 billion and $40 billion should be used annually to tackle climate change, but industrialised countries have given only a tenth of the amount that they had pledged, totalling only $43 million. It also recommends that greenhouse emissions should be cut by between 60% to 90%, which exceeds the targets set out in the Kyoto agreement which required industrial states to cut their emissions by an average of only 5.2% by the period 2008 to 2012. More than 160 countries have ratified the Kyoto protocol, including the developed countries of Europe and Japan.
Following a key summit on climate change in Nairobi in November and the publication of the report by Up In Smoke 2, the United Nations has now also publicly warned that the effects of global warming on Africa could be greater than previously feared. The summit in Nairobi looked at the progress made on the cutting of emissions by industrious nations, as set out in the Kyoto agreement and looked for a way to increase the agreed percentage of greenhouse gas emissions cut as set out in Kyoto. The eleven day conference drew 6,000 delegates from 189 nations, a testament to the growing concern of countries on the effects of global warming. However, the measures agreed on at the end of the summit fell short of matching the scale of the problem faced by the world. For example, it was agreed that only a minimal review would be held into a proposed increase in the percentage of emission cuts by developed nations; and that this review would take place in 2008. Environmentalist campaigners were disappointed with the outcome of the summit, “Ministers are simply not reflecting the urgency which is being felt in the real world. We are still not seeing the bold leadership which is needed here,” lamented Catherine Pearce of Friends of the Earth UK.
The risks of continued progressive climate change has recently gained more media coverage over the last few months forcing this issue to list high on the priorities of industrialised nation states. An estimated 20,000 people gathered in Trafalgar Square in London on November 4, before the opening of the summit in Nairobi calling for immediate action on climate change. Earlier that week Tony Blair had urged the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, that when Germany assumes the G8 presidency in 2007 it should continue with its efforts to reach an international agreement to tackle climate change that would replace the Kyoto protocol when it expires in 2012. He also expressed that successive presidents should continue with the UK’s commitments to tackling climate change and poverty in Africa, as set out under the UK presidency of the European Union in 2005. The European Union, a main backer of Kyoto, wants the United States and developing nations such as China and India to sign up for more action on climate change beyond 2012, evidence at least that the developed countries of the world are taking affirmative (baby) steps towards tackling global warming.
Africa is the fastest growing region in the world, but faces the greatest shortage in food and water, making the continents inhabitants some of the most vulnerable on planet earth. Its history is vast and complicated and its peoples vary in language, religion and culture. Political instability, recurrent violence and poverty all blight the continent and as a result Africa falls behind many countries in basic human needs.
Africa must now also fear climate change, as it threatens to take away the land from under its feet.
At the Nairobi summit, Kenyan Environment Minister, Kivutha Kibwana, told delegates, “Climate change is rapidly emerging as one of the most serious threats that humanity may ever face” and urged delegates to save the billions of the world’s poorest populations from the effects of global warming. “We face a genuine danger that recent gains in poverty reduction will be thrown into reverse in the coming decades, particularly for the poorest people of the world and especially those in the continent of Africa,” he said.
With the increasing danger that climate change poses on the most vulnerable and poorest communities in the world, we must now face that this danger is man-made and that the solution therefore must lie with us. With global environmental tragedies such as the recent droughts and floods in Africa how long can we avoid the issue of climate change, before we realise our responsibilities to our planet and the effects of our over consumption on our less developed neighbours?
We have the opportunity now to prevent the potential deaths of millions of Africans, but to do this we must take positive steps towards reducing our dependency on fossil fuels, and we must promote new and clean technologies. Only then will we be on route to avoid the doom of climate change that threatens not just to destroy Africa but also much more of the developing world.

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