The impact of climate change in poor countries primed and … – eldia.es

The impact of climate change in poor countries primed and … – eldia.es

The consequences of climate change, which is already installed in the world, have a greater impact on poor countries and rural areas, a phenomenon that specialists call “adaptive divide”.

“In developed countries, citizens are more protected, but in poor countries, people are more exposed to changes resulting from climate change, such as the resurgence of diseases transmitted by insects” explained Simon Anderson, director of the climate change group IIED Institute of Great Britain.

Anderson, who this weekend joined the XX Conference on Climate Change held in Lima (Peru ), participated in Bilbao at the conference “Klimagune 2014″ organized by the Basque Centre for Climate Change (BC3) and the University of the Basque Country (UPV / EHU).

This day has focused on climate change and rural areas, because although most research in this area focus on industry, transport and urban areas, rural areas is responsible for 14 percent of emissions of greenhouse gases, they are the cause of climate change according to data released by the BC3

Of that percentage, 31 percent corresponds to the livestock sector.; 13 percent to the application of synthetic fertilizers and 10 percent from tropical deforestation.

Simon Anderson explained, in an interview with Efe that some rural activities that contribute to climate change also are changing land use, releasing air the carbon that is underground, and the methane expelled by animals.

After emphasizing that climate change “as is inevitable, although emissions were reduced to zero “, this researcher has warned that the impacts” more severe “as floods, droughts and landslides affect more to rural areas because it depends more heavily on natural resources.

Poor countries also suffer the worst consequences of this phenomenon because they lack less public and health protection, and gave the example of Kenya, where the temperature increase has allowed access to offshore areas of insects that transmit diseases such as malaria.

“Kenya is not the world’s poorest country, but its health system can not cope with this change and the important consequence is an increase in infant mortality,” said.

“Part of the solution,” said Anderson, would be the introduction of a carbon tax, as promoted by some economists, to which should be added setting reduction targets “ambitious” emissions and state laws including those goals for the country, regardless of who governs.

In rural areas, the “rational and very feasible” solution would be to change production methods in order to keep carbon in the ground and increase the area of ​​forests, because trees absorb CO2 and also create a favorable environment for agricultural production microclimate.

It has also highlighted that technologies exist today to make the move to greener productions, without going through the phase of “inefficient” use of energy, as has happened in many developed countries.

Regarding the meeting in Lima, Anderson has held that the challenge is to develop a new protocol, which will replace the current Kyoto Protocol.

“This is the great challenge, because some countries did not sign Kyoto, such as the US, and we must seek agreement on entering all and that have a sufficient level of ambition to be effective, “he stated.