Sleepwalking into disaster

The aftermath of a flood in Bangladesh. Many of this woman's countrymen often do not escape such disasters with their lives

IMAGINE the population of Cardiff dying in a year because of floods or drought. There are no preventions to make sure it will never happen again. There are some meetings in the calendar to discuss what could or should be done, not what will be done. According to these sums, the population of Wales would be wiped in 10 years. There would be public outrage, and action would be demanded by every single one of us.

You don’t need to imagine. This is what is taking place at the moment, because of the effects of climate change. A report published recently by the Global Humanitarian Forum estimates that 300,000 lives are lost each year from floods, storms, heatwaves and other so-called freak weather occurrences. It also projects that increasingly severe weather patterns will be responsible for as many as half a million deaths a year by 2030, making it the greatest humanitarian challenge the world faces.

So when will the world wake up to what really needs to be done to combat climate change?

As it stands the world, is sleepwalking into a disaster. Unless world leaders wake up pretty soon we will all face a living nightmare. For people all over the world who are aware of or already feeling the effects of climate change, it is perplexing and frustrating that there is so much talking and negotiating taking place on an issue that is effectively a ticking time bomb. That’s why we have to make world leaders wake up before it’s too late.

Now is the time. This September is packed with high level meetings where critical decisions will be taken – at G20 gatherings and UN get-togethers from Pittsburgh to Bangkok – that will pave the way and prepare the political will towards the most important meeting of all, the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December. This is when world leaders will decide our destiny. We need to wake up governments, particularly in developed countries, to their historic responsibility, as the main polluters and as those with the resources to deal with it, and aim to make the wake-up call so loud that it is ringing in their ears for days.

Stop Climate Chaos Cymru – a coalition made up of environment and development charities, unions, faith, community and women’s groups – will add its voice to a global wake up call next Monday.

At 12:18 pm local time, on 21 September, thousands of people in cities, towns and villages around the world will make a massive noise – with alarms going off left, right and centre – one that leaders can not ignore. The time signifies the date December 18^th: the last day of the critical negotiations that will take place in Copenhagen. Cardiff will play host to Wales’ role in this global demand for action with alarm clocks, mobile phones and Cardiff Council’s screen all chiming in unison.

The Global Wake Up Call is about making change happen, and about making sure that anyone is able to bring about change. It’s about changing the terms of the debate on climate change, changing the level of ambition in the lead up to the Copenhagen conference.

Starting this month, the leaders at UN meetings and then the G20 Summit must agree to the financing required so the Copenhagen meeting in December can reach a global agreement. The buck doesn’t so much stop as start here – money needs to be promised to the poorest countries to help them adapt to current threats as well allowing them to develop in a low carbon way. The deal must be fair, ambitious and binding.

Fair – reduce rich country emissions of greenhouse gases by at least 40% by 2020, support poor countries to adapt to the worst consequences of the climate crisis, and develop their economies in an environmentally friendly way.

Ambitious – ensure that global greenhouse emissions peak no later than 2015 and then decline steeply, and create a pathway to clean jobs and energy for all and establish necessary conditions for a sustainable and prosperous future for people and biodiversity all over the world.

Binding – agree to a legally-binding international agreement that can be verified and enforced.

Anything less and the world will miss its own lifeboat.

At a recent social gathering a friend mentioned that she knew of somebody that I might like to meet: “You’d like him, he’s into all that climate change stuff.” I responded: “What? Because you’re not? You’d rather the world melt?”

For many people, caring about what will eventually happen to the planet and its people is not a major concern. It’s something that happens elsewhere and for somebody else to worry about. You’re a bit of a green freak if you actually want to talk about it – make a noise about it.

But it’s not over there, too far away to have to care about it. In fact, signs of climate change are becoming apparent even on our doorstep in Wales. It may not come in the guise of drowned villages, devastated crops or corpses – yet. But WWF Cymru’s Climate Witness programme has highlighted that the signs are here. Wyn Evans, a farmer from Pembrokeshire, has recorded many changes on his organic farm over the last 40 years, including less frequent snow blizzards, increased drought conditions, higher wind speeds and more flash floods in the summer months. He’s installed a range of renewable energy projects on his farm to reduce its carbon footprint.

Maybe the tragedy and immediacy of the situation isn’t hampering our daily life or threatening our comfortable lifestyles at the moment. It’s something we read or see films about. But by the very nature of the term – ‘global warming’ – it’s not a problem that will remain within the confines of international boundaries or country borders. It’s a shared problem, which therefore necessitates a collective response and effort.

We can’t bury our heads any longer and expect the problem to drift away. It’s here, it’s real. There is still time to build a greener, safer world. But time is marching on and the clock is ticking.

So now it’s time to wake up the world and make it shape up for Copenhagen.