This morning Gemma Jones has written an article in the Daily Telegraph that is highly critical of the Australian Governments spend on climate change as a component of its international development assistance. She questions why the Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID) has spent $1.5 million teaching foreign countries about climate change, including spending on expos and DVDs.
Climate change is one of the major constraints to ending poverty, inequality and enabling people to enjoy their human rights. Over half a billion additional people in the tropics – 526 million people – could be at risk of hunger because of climate change by 2050, according to recent estimates by the Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS).
Rich countries such as Australia bear the overwhelming responsibility for the devastating impact that climate change is having on food production in poor countries. And their current actions are making things worse. A binding deal to limit global warming is nowhere in sight. Promised ‘fast start’ funding to cope with climate change is still only a trickle and aid funds for agriculture are still woefully inadequate, badly undermining poor countries’ chances of taking adequate steps to increase food production in time.
Projections of the likely impacts of climate change on agriculture by 2050 are getting more acute by the year. Climate change is already having dramatic consequences for agriculture and international food security. Scientists estimate that global production of key staples such as wheat and corn fell by 3.8 per cent and 5.5 per cent, respectively, over the last three decades as a result of climate change.
Increasing temperatures, leading to lower and erratic rainfall, warming and rising sea levels, melting glaciers, more frequent storms, typhoons, hurricanes and wildfires, plus droughts and run-away land degradation, are already a reality. Periodic surveys by ActionAid in 28 countries over 2011 indicate that climate impacts are disrupting farming practices in all countries surveyed.
Most experts believe that thanks to a deadlock in international negotiations over emissions cuts, the window to limit temperature increases to 2ºC has already closed. If leaders fail to implement binding emissions targets soon, the world could be on track to warm up by 4–5ºC, with disastrous consequences for farmers and agriculture. Alarmingly, the chief economist at the International Energy Agency, Fatih Birol, says that global temperatures have not been 3ºC higher than today for about 3 million years.
With such alarming climate scenarios becoming starker by the day, it is little wonder that the World Bank estimates that developing countries will need US$75–$100 billion per year to mitigate and adapt their economies, natural resources and agricultural systems to rapidly intensifying climate change.
Does the 1.5 million spent by the Australian Government on enabling developing countries to educate themselves about the impact of climate change still seem a big deal?
Additional comments powered by BackType
