Green Times

Region especially vulnerable to natural disastersThe 2007-2008 Human Development Report published by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) examines the impact of climate change and warns that global warming could have a disastrous impact on many developing nations if world leaders do not take serious steps to reduce carbon emissions.

The effects of climate change will have a particularly strong impact on developing countries that lack the resources to adapt to global warming and protect themselves against disasters such as drought or hurricanes.

The report concludes that the developed world must rethink an economic model based on unfettered consumption that has proven environmentally unsustainable. However, the bitter wrangling that went on during the recent Bali Climate Change Conference made it clear that many developed nations lack the political will to resist mounting pressure from the motor vehicle industry to reduce pollution targets.

Although no one will escape the effects of climate change, it is clear that developing countries will be hit hardest as natural disasters become more frequent and those with the least resources sink even deeper into poverty.

While this is undoubtedly true, most experts agree that climate change has made the world more prone to hurricanes. As well as making the isthmus more vulnerable to natural disasters, the rise in ocean temperature will have a strong impact on biodiversity in the region, as can be seen by the progressive erosion of the Mesoamerican Barrier Reef.

Impact of climate change on the isthmus
The report concludes that climate change will worsen poverty and inequality in a region that already has one of the worst inequality indices in the world.

The chasm between developed and developing countries will also widen.
Inequality in terms of human development makes a country more vulnerable to the impact of climate change.

For instance when Hurricane Stan hit Guatemala, disparities between the indigenous and non-indigenous population prevented a speedy recovery in the aftermath of the disaster.

The Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED) manages the International Disaster Database (EM-DAT) which records all information on natural disasters across the globe. However, EM-DAT has failed to record the impact of natural disasters on marginal urban populations such as shanty town dwellers or on remote rural areas.

When Hurricane Stan hit Guatemala, EM-DAT recorded the 500,000 people who were directly affected by the disaster ‘ those who died or lost their homes ‘ but not those who suffered from chronic malnutrition after they lost their crops.

The impact of Hurricane Mitch, which hit Honduras in 1998 is another case in point. In the aftermath of the hurricane, the country’s poorest households lost between 30 percent and 40 percent of their income after their crops were destroyed.

As a result, the number of Hondurans living below the poverty line rose from 69 percent to 77 percent.

Honduras is one of the most unequal countries in the world with a Gini coefficient of 54 for wealth distribution, which means that the poorest 20 percent of the population receives 3 percent of the country’s income.

When a country like Honduras is hit by a natural disaster and the poor loose what little income they may have, the vicious circle of poverty and inequality only worsens. This should act as an ominous warning for Central America where sustained economic growth over the past 14 years has failed to reduce inequality.

Safety measures
According to ‘Climate Change in Latin America and the Caribbean 2006,’ a report published by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), points out that Latin America has made progress in terms of developing disaster mitigation programs but warns that much work remains to be done for the region to adapt to changing weather patterns.

However, the world’s poor are not passive victims when disasters strike. Although many people in the developing world cannot afford insurance policies, they have developed their own insurance mechanisms, such as gathering livestock during normal seasons which can then be sold in times of crisis or diversifying agricultural produce and means of income.

For instance, in El Salvador, a survey revealed that people living in urban shanty towns invest up to 9 percent of their income in protecting their dwellings against floods and use family labor to build walls and drainage canals.

Indigenous people will be among the worst affected by climate change as they depend on ecosystems which will suffer the impact of changing weather patterns.

The report concludes that developed countries, home to just 15 percent of the world’s population, generate almost half of all carbon emissions and must take responsibility for the effects of this in developing countries by reducing their emissions 30 percent by 2020, and by greater investment in funds to prevent and mitigate natural disasters in these countries.

Governments in the region must also play a role in combating climate change in their own way, such as reformulating their energy policies.

Researcher Gian Carlo Delgado Ramos, of the Autonomous Metropolitan University of Azcapotzalco in Mexico, says increased hydroelectric projects that are booming throughout Meso-America as a part of Plan Puebla Panama (PPP), have been erroneously labeled environmentally-friendly.

The researcher says that they contribute to global warming since vegetation and other organic material is flooded and decomposes with exposure to large quantities of carbon dioxide and methane.

Source: Latin America Press