The Anatomy of A Silent Crisis The Anatomy of A Silent Crisis

4 Forum 2009: Climate Change — The Anatomy of a Silent Crisis
The time to act is now
Climate change threatens sustainable development and all eight Millennium Development Goals.
The international community agreed at the beginning of the new millennium to eradicate extreme
hunger and poverty by 2015. Yet, today, climate change is already responsible for forcing some
fifty million additional people to go hungry and driving over ten million additional people into extreme
poverty. Between one-fifth and one-third of Official Development Assistance is in climate sensitive
sectors and thereby highly exposed to climate risks.
To avert the worst outcomes of climate change, adaptation efforts need to be scaled up by a
factor of more than 100 in developing countries. The only way to reduce the present human impact
is through adaptation. But funding for adaptation in developing countries is not even one percent of
what is needed. The multilateral funds that have been pledged for climate change adaptation funding
currently amount to under half a billion US dollars.
Despite the lack of funding, some cases of successful adaptation do provide a glimmer of hope.
Bangladesh is one such example. Cyclone Sidr, which struck Bangladesh in 2007, demonstrates
how well adaptation and prevention efforts can pay off. Disaster preparation measures, such as
early warning systems and storm-proof houses, minimized damage and destruction. Cyclone Sidr’s
still considerable death toll of 3,400, and economic damages of $1.6 billion, nevertheless compare
favourably to the similar scale cyclone Nargis, which hit Myanmar in 2008, resulting in close to
150,000 deaths and economic losses of around $4 billion.
Solutions do also exist for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, some even with multiple benefits.
For instance, black carbon from soot, released by staple energy sources in poor communities, is likely
causing as much as 18 percent of warming. The provision of affordable alternative cooking stoves to
the poor can, therefore, have both positive health results, since smoke is eliminated, and an immediate
impact on reducing emissions, since soot only remains in the atmosphere for a few weeks.
Integrating strategies between adaptation, mitigation, development and disaster risk reduction can
and must be mutually reinforcing. Climate change adaptation, mitigation, humanitarian assistance and
development aid underpin each other, but are supported by different sets of institutions, knowledge
centres, policy frameworks and funding mechanisms. These policies are essential to combat the
human impact of climate change, but their links to one another have received inadequate attention.
A key conclusion of this report is that the global society must work together if humanity is to
overcome this shared challenge: nations have to realize their common interest at Copenhagen, acting
decisively with one voice; humanitarian and development actors of all kinds have to pool resources,
expertise and efforts in order to deal with the rapidly expanding challenges brought about by climate
change; and in general, people, businesses, and communities everywhere should become engaged
and promote steps to tackle climate change and end the suffering it causes.