ASIA: Asia hard hit by climate change
Updated
The U-N's fourth report on climate change was released warning that many sectors in Asia already affected by rising temperatures. As world leaders prepare to meet in Bali next month, Secretray General Ban Ki Moon has singled out China and the United States, to show leadership.
Presenter: Karon Snowdon
Speakers: Dr Murari Lal, lead author on the UN's latest climate change report; Dr Barry Pittock, a contributor to all four of the UN's intergovernmental climate change reports
SNOWDON: Rising sea levels, more heat waves, floods, and droughts, those words are repeated so often now they are almost abstract concepts.
In human terms they mean more hunger, disease and even poverty at a time of rapid development.
Especially in South and South East Asia and the Pacific.
Dr Murari Lal has been on the UN intergovernmental panel on climate change since its inception and is a lead author on the latest chapter on Asia.
He says research over the past five years indicates catastrophic weather events like the cyclone which last week devastated Bangladesh, are on the rise.
LAL: And perhaps the intensity of the cyclones in the Pacific and in the Indian Ocean, particularly the Bay of Bengal might increase. Even last week's cyclone in the Bay of Bengal because it was quite intense and it has led to close to about two-thousand-500 deaths.
SNOWDON: Dr Lal says it will be the poor who continue to suffer the most from climate change.
Leading Australian climate scientist and author, Barry Pittock agrees.
Also a contributor to all four UN reports Barry Pittock says the estimates of sea level rises in the latest report are already out of date as they're based on last year's figures when the report was being written.
PITTOCK: So we could be talking about a metre by 2100, and of course that has huge implications for coastal cities and coastal agriculture. It might displace millions of people in that region.
SNOWDON: Temperatures are now close to the limit where rice yields fall dramatically.
Global greenhouse gas emissions need to be cut by 5 per cent a year to go beyond stabilisation and make cuts that will reverse existing damage.
Dr Murari Lal says the cycle of unsustainable land use and deforrestation has to be reversed in Asia, despite the pressure of growing populations.
LAL: They have to try to reduce the carbon emissions otherwise if you keep on exploiting the resources faster than what the environment system can take it up, then ultimately you are going to face a catastrophe one day by 2015.
SNOWDON: For the leaders meeting in Bali next month the challenge will be to get a compromise where the rich countries and major developing nations agree on the seriousness of the threat.
It needs a big commitment by both sides - for industrial nations to accept serious carbon cuts, while India and China agree to do their bit.
PITTOCK: Those countries that can afford it should have very severe targets for reducing emissions. The developing countries need to absolutely minimise the growth in admissions, and that means putting much emphasis on leap-frogging over the carbon intensive industries and methods into modern technology which is much more energy efficient and using renewable energy. It's a huge resource in the desert regions of China and India and other places for solar energy, you can generate a lot as you certainly could in Australia.
SNOWDON: Dr Lal says arguments by the US and Australian governments for a one size fits all solution is unrealistic.
LAL: Binding target won't mean anything unless and until it is enforced, and enforcing it is going to be a tremendous task for any of these countries.
