Kenya’s extensive coastline has been fronted as a hub for carbon trading due to its lush mangrove forests. But now experts caution that carbon markets are exploitative greenwashing systems. Credit: Joyce Chimbi/IPS
by Joyce Chimbi (nairobi)
Inter Press Service
NAIROBI, Nov 10 (IPS) – Somalia, Syria, DRC Congo, Afghanistan, Yemen, Chad, South Sudan, Central African Republic, Nigeria, and Ethiopia are the 10 countries at greatest risk of climate disaster globally despite collectively contributing just 0.28 percent of global CO2 emissions. A climate-induced humanitarian crisis continues to unfold across these countries and many others in the global South, including Kenya, which declared drought a national disaster in September 2021.
Flash floods, failed rainy seasons, severe food insecurity, and climate-induced health disasters such as cholera are becoming frequent, and their debilitating effects are increasingly difficult to mitigate. In late 2022, for instance, floods caused extensive damage to farmlands in Nigeria, and projections show 25 million Nigerians could face high levels of food insecurity by the end of 2023.
Against this backdrop, there is growing concern that the carbon market has failed Africa and other developing countries in the global South. Governments and companies created carbon market systems to address their greenhouse emissions – a trading system in which carbon credits are sold and bought. One tradable carbon credit is equivalent to one tonne of carbon dioxide, or the amount of different greenhouse gases reduced, sequestered, or avoided.
Fadhel Kaboub, a Tunisian economist based in Nairobi, a senior advisor with Power Shift Africa and the President of the Global Institute for Sustainable Prosperity, tells IPS, “Carbon credits are pollution permits that allow global North polluters to continue polluting while offering financial crumbs to the global South. They displace vulnerable communities from their ancestral territory and pastoral land. They enrich middlemen and speculators.”
Kaboub, who is also an Associate Professor of Economics at Denison University, says, “Through the dominant market power of the corporations that buy these pollution permits, they pass the cost of the carbon credits on to their customers, many of whom are actually in the Global South, so we end up paying for it indirectly.”
There are experts, however, such as those powering the Africa Carbon Markets Initiative (ACMI), who are proactively promoting the carbon market systems as a powerful tool to deliver carbon justice. And for developing countries to accelerate socio-economic development by leveraging on selling carbon while transitioning to a low-carbon economy.
ACMI seeks to capture more of Africa’s potential in carbon markets by addressing the challenges to voluntary carbon market growth and building the foundations for a thriving voluntary carbon market ecosystem in Africa by 2030. Its priority areas are “not only on driving decarbonisation activities but also on driving economic development by supporting energy access, scaling the clean energy transition, protecting forests, improving agriculture, and creating new income sources.”
However, a recent report found that “ACMI’s growth target would allow big private companies to emit an additional 1.5-2.5 Gigatonnes CO2e per year by 2050, more than the total emissions from fossil fuels from all of Africa in 2021 and double the entire annual CO2 emissions from all of sub-Saharan Africa.”
IPS reached out to ACMI for comment, but it had not come back to us at the time of publication.
But carbon trading is not universally seen as a panacea to addressing global warming.
South African-based Dr Shehnaaz Moosa, the director and head of finance hub at SouthSouthNorth, which is a climate change non-profit organisation, tells IPS that carbon markets have the potential to either reinforce or mitigate historic structural inequalities between the global North and South.
“But given the dismal failure of the Clean Development Mechanism and the greenwashing of the voluntary carbon market, I am in the camp that believes it will reinforce these deep inequalities. The carbon market allows big polluters to keep doing so with no overall reduction in their emissions. Local projects in the global South that reduce carbon are exploited with no real benefit accruing to the communities.”
Moosa, who also lectures in Chemical Engineering at the University of Cape Town, says carbon trading must be seen for what it is, “a lot of hot air to legitimise the continued production of greenhouse emissions. We keep hearing the rhetoric that depending on how the market is structured, it will be of benefit, which is a Northern narrative, and there is no way to structure exploitation that will make it equitable because it is exactly what carbon trading is: exploitation.”
Kaboub affirms, citing a recent investigation that found that the majority of carbon offset projects essentially amount to greenwashing fraud – making false or misleading statements about the environmental benefits of a product or practice – that does nothing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Stressing that this is one of the most disturbing climate finance false solutions and dangerous distractions.
Moosa and Kaboub emphasise that the cause of disagreement is that carbon markets are attractive to high polluters as they enable wealthy industrialised nations and corporations to maintain carbon-intensive and climate-warming practices while transferring their emission reduction duties to Africa. Stressing that it is time to explore other climate financing mechanisms and bring into full effect the Polluter Pays Principle – one of the key principles underlying the European Union’s environmental policy.
The principle demands that polluters bear the costs of their pollution, including the cost of measures taken to prevent, control and remedy pollution and the costs it imposes on society. As such, polluters are incentivised to avoid environmental damage and are held responsible for the pollution that they cause. It is also the polluter, and not the taxpayer, who covers the cost of remediation.
Moosa is particularly focused on Loss and Damage, “while the Loss and Damage funding arrangements are being designed, we do not need to be distracted by a concept that only works for the big polluters. The developing countries’ energies should be directed to Loss and Damage and Adaptation finance because there cannot be climate justice until climate injustice is addressed. The global North has a long way to go to address these injustices, and carbon markets are not a way to do it.”
Kaboub agrees, calling for a need to steer clear of the carbon market as African countries that have not contributed to climate change and who are, in fact, the victims of climate-induced shocks are now being forced to give up territorial sovereignty over large swaths of land to foreign corporations to issue pollution permits – adding that this is a new form of colonialism.
NEW DELHI, India, Nov 10 (IPS) – For a long time, the agriculture sector has been heralded as a success story for India. Spurred by the Green Revolution, it provided a path-breaking solution to feed the country’s burgeoning population starting in the 1960s.
However, in recent decades, intensive land use and inequitable water resource management, compounded by a swelling population, prevailing poverty, depletion of natural resources, and a rapidly changing climate have put tremendous pressure on the country’s agricultural output.
The 2023 Global Hunger Index ranked India 111th out of 125 countries, indicating a serious level of hunger, with concerns growing about the possibility of long-term food scarcity. And earlier this year, The Women and Child Development Ministry found that nearly 8% of the country’s children were malnourished.
A similar situation pervades in various parts of the world:?139 million people?plunged into acute food insecurity in 2021, and in 2022, an estimated?2.4 billion people worldwide did not have regular access to safe, nutritious, and sufficient food.
The Famine Early Warning Systems Network has projected approximately 100 million people worldwide will need food assistance through early 2024, in large part because of the El Niño.
Credit: UNICEF/Safidy Andriananten
The food crisis continued to worsen last year, as the tremors of the Russo-Ukrainian War and its trade policies and the economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic were felt across the globe. As of October 30, 2023, 19 countries have implemented 27 food export bans, and seven have implemented 15 export-limiting measures.
At the upcoming COP28 (30 November- 12 December in Dubai), governments must commit to taking serious action to curb the impacts of our food and land use systems on our climate. This includes: (1) urging nations to include emissions from food systems in their climate commitments; (2) addressing poor water management; and (3) adopting climate-resilient agriculture practices.
Agriculture and GHG emissions
A lack of sustainable agriculture production has made the food and land use sector a major contributor to total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Global food systems account for?31% of global emissions?and could become a major factor in exceeding 1.5°C of warming between 2051 and 2063.?
Moreover, agricultural?land today takes up 38 percent of the global land surface. Nearly one-third of this is used as cropland, while the remaining two-thirds consist of meadows and pastures for grazing livestock. This comes at the cost of extensive deforestation and biodiversity loss. ?Agriculture accounts on average for? 70%?of all freshwater withdrawals globally.
The challenge is even more acute for India, which accounts for about 17% of the world’s population but only 4% of the world’s freshwater resources. In fact, nearly 55% of Indians are dependent on agriculture. With the Indian population estimated to reach 1.67 billion by 2050, the demand on water, food and energy is only expected to increase.
Addressing Poor Water Management
Climate change has substantially impacted agricultural productivity, making better water management a necessity. India’s chief crop produce—rice, wheat, and sugarcane—consume the most water. Indian agriculture accounts for 90% water use due to fast-track groundwater depletion and poor irrigation systems. Due to an inept water resource management system and persistent climate change, the country faces regular water shortages.
Distorted water pricing has compounded the issue and is chiefly responsible for the over-extraction of India’s groundwater. Furthermore, subsidized electricity to farmers for pumping water for agricultural activities has led to instances of increased groundwater extraction, and shifting cropping pattern towards more water-intensive crops, like the rice paddy.
Efficient irrigation systems should be developed and implemented to economize water and reduce crop vulnerabilities. The use of water-saving technologies and conservation agriculture technologies, such as drip sprinkler irrigation and sub-soil irrigation, have proven extremely effective in both water conservation and increasing crop yields.
Alternate wetting and drying (AWD) and Direct Seeded Rice have also demonstrated success as water management techniques for rice plantations, whereas efforts to expand the use of millets, a highly nutritious crop that can grow on arid lands and is resilient to climate changes, in emerging economies should also be accelerated.
Climate Resilient Agriculture
It is well established that climate change is a threat to agriculture, and resilient agriculture practices forged through efficient technologies, innovations, and circular economy practices must be incentivized and scaled.
Despite being the world’s leading producer in jute, milk, wheat sugarcane, vegetable, and rice, India continues to face post-harvest losses. A 2022 study revealed that between harvesting and consumption, the country lost 5-13% of its fruits and vegetables and around 3-7% of crops that included oil, seeds, and spices.
In particular, the significant use of chemical fertilizers by Indian farmers due to huge subsidies given by the government is a major contributor not only to emissions and environmental pollution, but to the degradation of soil.
Sustainable alternatives, such as nanofertilizers and bioinoculants like mycorrhizaes should be explored to both reduce burdens on the government as well as curb the environmental impacts of traditional fertilizers. Combined agro-waste (crop-residue and livestock manure) management and increasing the use of biogas plants can also help to reduce carbon emissions and produce more resilient crops.
The world is ready to make a transition towards sustainable food and land use practices, and national leaders should seize this opportunity to intensify their fight against climate change. COP28 offers an important platform to accelerate the transformation of our food and land-use systems towards a better, progressive future.
? Vibha Dhawan is Chair of SDSN South Asia and Director General of The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI)
Coastal protection at Anse Kerlan Beach in the Seychelles where residents often take the initiative to protect their properties from the impact of climate-change-induced environmental changes. The Commonwealth Climate Finance Access Hub assists small island states, among others, with climate finance and technical assistance. Credit: Kadir van Lohuizen/NOOR/UNEP
by Joyce Chimbi (nairobi)
Inter Press Service
Climate change finance will continue to be a focal point during the upcoming COP28 negotiations in the UAE. Dr Oldman Koboto, manager and advisor for the Commonwealth Climate Finance Hub, speaks about what’s expected.
NAIROBI, Nov 08 (IPS) – As the countdown to COP28 in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, continues, IPS caught up with Dr Oldman Koboto, Mauritius-based Manager for the Commonwealth Climate Finance Access Hub (CCFAH).
The hub was established through the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in 2013 to provide technical assistance aimed at enhancing the countries’ access to international climate finance. This is achieved through technical assistance around project proposal development, policy support, human and institutional capacity building, knowledge management, and learning, all of which are anchored on gender and youth mainstreaming.
The hub embeds climate finance experts in individual government ministries to work with and offer technical support. The experts help identify project proposals, provide policy support, and, above all, build the capacity of both technical and institutional capacity in those ministries to develop bankable funding proposals. Since its operationalization in 2016, the hub has supported member countries to access USD 315 million in climate finance. Additionally, projects amounting to over USD 800 million are in the pipeline.
Here are excerpts from the interview.
Dr Oldman Koboto
IPS: What is the nature of climate negotiations thus far?
Koboto: Negotiations are progressing well, in my view, considering the historical background. Negotiations started when climate jurisprudence was still in its infancy. It has since progressed to a point of more certainty around legal systems and transformative approaches to address the climate change convention’s objectives. Negotiations have moved from the actual architect for implementing the convention to innovative approaches toward achieving the 1.5°C Paris Agreement aspiration.
One of the pending issues, especially on finance, is the establishment of the Loss and Damage Fund – to be operationalized through the COP28. The draft outcome document for the Transitional Committee on operationalizing the Loss and Damage Fund showed consensus that could catalyze its operation. That being said, critical gaps still exist. IPCC cautions that even if we were to implement all the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), we would still not achieve the 1.5°C targets, many of them centered around mitigation actions.
This is an indictment on the international community, through these negotiations, to make progress on adaptation-related issues. And fast-track resilience building and adaptative capacities of small and other vulnerable member states. One of the innovative approaches is leveraging private sector finance for NDCs towards climate mitigation action. But, the design parameters for both adaptation and mitigation projects are such that mitigation actions are attractive to the private sector more than adaptation measures. This creates innovation gaps toward adaptation actions, and yet mitigation initiatives do not build significant resilience. There are, therefore, successes and challenges to these negotiations.
IPS: Have countries voiced concerns regarding these negotiations?
Koboto: Almost all countries raise concerns around the pending areas and celebrate progressive areas. Countries prepare to go into the COPs by developing country positions informed by developments in international negotiations. They then build interventions around points of divergence to be ironed out in upcoming negotiations to inform or shape COP outcomes. This, on its own, is a demonstration of the countries’ concerns around those specific agenda items. It is not about one country speaking about being unhappy, but the process itself, through the established legal frameworks, enables countries to raise their concerns through platforms where such consensus could become part of the formal documentation for the COP process.
IPS: Is Africa better placed for COP28 negotiations, having recently held its inaugural Climate Summit?
Koboto: The inaugural Africa Climate Summit was a step in the right direction. It allowed African countries to paint their own vision and develop a basket of issues to push forward within international negotiations. The Nairobi Summit was consistent with other platforms for engagement on development challenges facing Africa. The message was that Africa is part of the solution and requests to be treated as equals, which is consistent with the messaging at the World Economic Forums and UN General Assembly. The draft outcome of the Loss and Damage Fund Transitional Committee indicates that developed countries’ parties will contribute to the financing of loss and damage and that developing country parties are also encouraged to contribute.
IPS: What sustains the impasse on climate financing between developed and developing countries? What will it take to break the impasse?
Koboto: This is a tough one because it falls at the heart of the principle of Common but Differentiated Responsibilities and Respective Capabilities of the UNFCCC. Having said that, it is also very difficult to target one country with the capability or capacity to provide support because of foundational principles of state policy, which sets the direction of each country regarding national and international interests. It goes without saying that national interests take precedence over international interests in areas where the two compete.
There is a willingness at the international level for developed countries to help. Meanwhile, the African continent must design innovative financing instruments to facilitate access to climate finance and attract investments to the continent. Such innovative mechanisms can be developed in subsequent African climate summits. The global climate solution lies in Africa, for the continent still has a lot of unexploited potential both in resources and opportunities around geothermal, hydrothermal, and solar energy.
IPS: What are the expectations from small island states and other vulnerable countries on new funding mechanisms and the Loss and Damage Fund going into COP28?
Koboto: The newest funding mechanism is the Loss and Damage Fund. Others are the Global Environment Facility, the Green Climate Fund, and the Adaptation Fund. African countries are unrelenting about the USD100 billion pledge made at COP15. All these funds must trickle down to developing states so that the Loss and Damage Fund becomes just an additional funding to existing funding sources.
African countries are focused on building enough consensus and influencing developed countries to deliver on promises made. Institutions such as the Commonwealth Climate Finance Access Hub, which I lead, stand ready to facilitate African countries’ access to those Funds as soon as there is predictable and adequate funding in those Funds.
CCFAH can provide technical assistance to enhance access to climate investments at a country level and to build capacities to access these funds without the use of third parties. But these countries are unrelenting and are firmly focused on unlocking much-needed climate finance to establish and or accelerate climate action.
That’s the message from UN World Meteorological Organization (WMO), which said on Wednesday that for the calendar year to date, the global mean temperature is the highest ever recorded, 1.43 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, and sea ice in the Antarctic remains at record low levels.
WMO expects the warming El Niño climate pattern to last at least until April 2024, contributing to a further spike in temperatures.
Head of WMO, Petteri Taalas, said that as El Niño’s impacts on global temperature typically play out in the year after its development, next year “may be even warmer”.
Fuel on the fire
While El Niño occurs naturally, it takes place in the context of climate change fuelled by “increasing concentrations of heat-trapping greenhouse gases from human activities,” Prof. Taalas stressed.
He warned that extreme weather events such as heatwaves, drought, wildfires, heavy rain and floods will be worse in some regions.
“That is why WMO is committed to the Early Warnings For All initiative to save lives and minimize economic losses,” he added.
The previous warmest year on record was 2016 due to a “double whammy” of an exceptionally strong El Niño and climate change.
El Niño is created by warm waters coming to the surface which are then released as extra heat into the atmosphere.
Since May this year, monthly average sea surface temperature anomalies in the central-eastern equatorial Pacific have warmed significantly, rising from about 0.5 °C above average to around 1.5 °C above average in September, WMO said.
These estimates are relative to the 1991-2020 baseline period, using the latest version of the Optimum Interpolation Sea Surface Temperature (OISST) dataset.
The most recent expert forecasts suggest a high likelihood of continued warming in the Pacific for at least the next four overlapping three-month seasons, through to February-April 2024.
A strong El Niño does not necessarily mean strong El Niño impacts locally, the UN agency stresses.
“It is important to note that El Niño is not the only factor that drives global and regional climate patterns, and that the magnitudes of El Niño indicators do not directly correspond to the magnitudes of their effects. No two El Niño events are alike.”
Warmest October by far
It was by far the warmest October on record, 0.85°C above the 1991-2020 average, and 0.40°C above the previous warmest October. The global temperature anomaly was the second highest across all months in the ERA5 dataset, behind September 2023, it said.
October marked the sixth consecutive month that Antarctic sea ice extent remained at record low levels for the time of year, with a monthly value 11 per cent below average. Arctic sea ice extent reached its 7th lowest value for October, at 12 per cent below average.
El Niño conditions continued to develop in the equatorial Pacific, although anomalies remain lower than those reached at this time of year during the development of the historically strong 1997 and 2015 events.
In October 2023, overall precipitation was above average across most of Europe, said WMO. Storm Babet hit northern Europe, and storm Aline impacted Portugal and Spain, bringing heavy rain and flooding.
Opinion by Jomo Kwame Sundaram (kuala lumpur, malaysia)
Inter Press Service
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Nov 08 (IPS) – Public-private partnerships (PPPs) for infrastructure and service provision are both costly and risky. Worse, PPPs typically fail to ensure universal, let alone fair access to public amenities.
Public-private partnerships?
PPPs usually involve long-term contractual arrangements in which private businesses provide infrastructure and services traditionally provided by governments. In recent years, PPPs have built or run hospitals, schools, prisons, roads, airports, railways, water and sanitation.
Jomo Kwame SundaramRisk-sharing between public and private sectors has long been widespread. In recent years, more than two dozen different types of PPPs have been identified. Such variations reflect differences in deals between governments and commercial partners.
Most international financial institutions (IFIs) advise governments to guarantee profits for their private partners. The IFIs continue to urge governments to ‘de-risk’ commercial providers to attract their investments.
Private investor preferences for specific types of PPPs may vary over time and with circumstances, often reflecting changing needs and priorities. As no one type fits all, changing circumstances and preferences have increased the variety of PPPs.
PPP problems
PPPs are far more complex than suggested by their cheerleaders’ narratives. Their negative impacts on infrastructure and public service delivery have been highlighted again by a Eurodad-led report. Public expenses rise as governments bear private costs and risks.
Following World Bank and other IFI advice, national authorities attract commercial financial investments by appealing to private greed. PPPs have been used to ‘de-risk’ such investment, by using their terms to ensure profits for private investors.
The report also exposed PPPs’ negative impacts for democratic governance. PPP arrangements typically lack transparency, and rarely involve prior consultation with affected communities. Thus, they have been more prone to corruption and abuse.
While private partners are guaranteed profits, their PPPs may still fail. In recent years, PPPs’ fiscal and other costs kept mounting as their shortfalls grew despite their rising profitability. As such problems grow, criticisms and dissent have risen.
Why PPPs fail?
PPPs have increasingly been touted as the magic solution to many problems, particularly financial constraints, poor management and delivery. PPPs have become popular among elites in the global South, where their ‘middle classes’ were enticed by the promise of better services and ‘trickle-down’.
The private sector is supposedly more efficient and better able to deliver public amenities including energy, education, health, water and sanitation. But better value for money has rarely ensued, as many studies show. Instead, the converse is more typical.
A 2020 study by the European Federation of Public Service Unions and Eurodad identified eight major reasons why PPPs in Europe have not improved outcomes.
First, PPPs rarely raised additional funds. Instead, they have typically incurred more public debt in the form of government guarantees, rather than direct borrowing. But such additional public debt has often been obscured from the public.
Second, private commercial loans generally cost much more than government borrowings. Third, public authorities, especially central governments, still bear ultimate responsibility, especially in the event of project failure.
Fourth, PPPs have rarely delivered better ‘value for money’ than reasonably managed public projects. Fifth, seeming PPP efficiency gains have been largely due to risky cost-cutting, e.g., in public infrastructure or healthcare provision.
Sixth, PPPs distort public policy priorities, typically requiring even more cost-cutting. Seventh, PPPs have rarely delivered both ‘on-time’ and ‘on-budget’. Eighth, PPP deals are typically opaque, rather than transparent, often involving abuses and corruption.
From early 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic exposed the long-term adverse effects of earlier austerity and underfunding of public health. More recently, inflation, stagnation and more extreme weather have exposed other vulnerabilities and their causes.
What can be done?
As the world faces multiple and interconnected crises, PPPs offer bogus, even dangerous solutions. Eurodad has made policy recommendations to national governments and development finance institutions (DFIs) to improve infrastructure and public service financing.
• Stop promoting PPPs. The World Bank, IMF, regional development banks and DFIs should all end the promotion of PPPs, especially for social services. Access to health, education, water and sanitation should not depend on capacity to pay.
• Fiscal and other major PPP risks should be publicly acknowledged. Governments should be warned of PPPs’ generally poor outcomes, and of the pros and cons of various financing arrangements. DFIs should all more effectively finance national plans for sustainable and equitable development.
Countries should be helped to find the best financing means to deliver responsible, transparent, gender-sensitive, environmentally and fiscally sustainable public infrastructure and social services consistent with national and multilateral obligations.
• Informed public consultations should always precede any infrastructure and public service provision agreement by PPPs. These should include ensuring the rights of all affected communities, including those to fair remedy or compensation.
• Exercise rigorous and transparent government regulation, especially for public spending, PPP contract values, project impacts, and long-term fiscal implications. The public interest must always prevail over commercial ones.
DFIs should only finance projects serving the public interest. Appropriate, publicly funded public services should be promoted, with transparent contracts for and accountable reporting on social service and infrastructure project delivery.
PPPs have often proved to be budgetary frauds, exacerbating, rather than reducing national fiscal deficits. Far from being the financial silver bullet they have been touted as, PPPs have proven to be blanks, making much noise, but with little real benefit.
Tandahara women tend to the new Casuarina plants. Credit: Manipadma Jena/IPS
by Manipadma Jena (puri, india)
Inter Press Service
PURI, India, Nov 07 (IPS) – For more than 33 years, a group of strong-willed women from the village of Tandahara, India have kept their homes and village safe and plan to continue despite the unrelenting impacts of increasingly severe monsoons.
The sun is high in the noon sky—humidity unrelenting at 95 percent in this Indian sea-coast village. The monsoon has been deficient; rice paddies are yellowing on the edges from the salty surf misting in on them. Waves now break barely 200 metres from the farms and homes.
Sixty-year-old Bengalata Rout heads for the Casuarina “forest wall” off the shoreline, trees that the women in the 108-household village Tandahara planted after the 1999 Super Cyclonic Storm decimated their mud-walled thatched-roof huts leaving their fertile farms salt-poisoned.
That year, 33 years ago, they planted the trees on the village boundary, a good distance away from the shoreline; today, on a stormy night, the sea crashes against the tree trunks, threatening to run amok into their homes.
Tandahara, sitting on the Bay of Bengal, is one of the last villages in the eastern Indian State Odisha, some 20 kilometres from Konark Sun Temple, UNESCO’s designated heritage site that is itself showing the impacts of seas closing in.
The ‘Big Storm’ Discovery
“When the big cyclone hit us, the Casuarina shelter belt that was standing from before, planted by the government, lay battered,” Rout told Inter Press Service (IPS) as we walked toward the Casuarina forest. “We immediately realised had it not been standing there between the sea and our village we would have been wiped out.”
And it was a life-changing discovery for these rural women.
The category-5 storm, carrying wind speeds of 160 miles hourly that made landfall over Odisha in October 1999, killed more than 10,000 people, mostly owing to 20 ft high storm surges that brought water 16 to 20 miles inland.
But Tandahara had not lost a single life. Losing no time, every woman volunteering, even the children clamouring to pitch in, they sorted themselves into ten groups of ten members with a mix of young and old. Saplings were requested from government and non-profits who came to help. Planting was done; the men lent a hand, but the women took it upon themselves to make sure the saplings survived.
“It was challenging. The soil had salted up, and the young plants struggled to survive,” said Kanaka Behera, 32, one of the younger women. “And the water we got in our village had turned a bit saline also.”
“We thought, for our cooking and drinking, we fetch groundwater from a shallow dug pit; why not get the sweet water for the plants, too? But that was a kilometre inland from our village, more distance from the plantation in the opposite direction. We will do it, we decided and dug the pit wider to get more water,” Behera added.
“For months till the plants survived, we would be up before the sun, lining up our buckets around the water pit where water replenishes naturally overnight. Then the real arduous work began,” said middle-aged Bena Mallika dressed in a bright green sari. Some ten of them would fill the buckets and hand them to ten others who relayed them to more waiting women till the saplings, one-and-half kilometres away, were sloshed and glistening. Only by noon, they were done, exhausted but triumphant, having carried one thousand buckets to the plants. They did this every alternate day. Meticulously, around each baby tree, they gouged a six-inch wide circular channel with their bare hands to hold the sweet water for longer and create an oasis of nutrition.
Bengalata Rout, the women’s group leader, poses amidst the Casuarina forest the women planted after the 1999 Super Cyclonic Storm. Credit: Manipadma Jena/IPS The women’s group poses on the narrow strip of beach that’s all that’s left between the village boundary and the advancing sea. Credit: Manipadma Jena/IPS Clusters of betel-vine bowers shelter behind the protective wall of Casuarina trees. Credit: Manipadma Jena/IPS
Climate Events More Frequent, Intense, and the Sea Keeps Getting Closer
But growing tree shields is a daunting exercise against a wounded, intermittently raging ocean. It is a handful of strong-willed women pitted against climate events getting more frequent and more intense from a rapidly warming sea. Odisha has encountered 10 cyclones in a span of 22 years from 1999 to 2021, with frequency rising over earlier decades, according to data from the Odisha State Disaster Management Authority (OSDMA), which works to reduce disaster risk.
More broadly, the Indian subcontinent has witnessed more than 478 extreme events since 1970, whose frequency has accelerated after 2005, IPS had earlier reported.
But another phenomenon, more insidiously devastating, is creeping in on Tandahara.
Sitting on a cemented platform under the shade of an ageing banyan tree, there are several elders who share how the sea has moved closer. Remembering over five decades back, 70-year-old Tahali Kalia Gopal Behera narrated to IPS, “When I was 18, we youngsters went to the sea to catch the red beach crabs. We carried our lunch and left home in the morning, returning only in the evening. Those days, the sea was more than 3 kilometres away.”
“The sea has eaten away 20 hectares of our village land,” Bidyadhar Bhuyan, another elderly man, said.
Of Odisha State’s over the 480-kilometre coastline, a high 79 percent has experienced drastic modification.
The State’s coastline change trend shows 21 percent has been subject to erosion, and 51 percent is impacted by accretion. Based on 26 years of satellite images, the 2018 study by the National Centre for Coastal Research of Earth Sciences Ministry remains the latest using such extensive data.
Odisha’s Puri province, where sea-front villages like Tandahara face the brunt, experienced the highest accretion on 110 km of its total 140 km shore length, this study said.
Coastal accretion is the gradual increase or acquisition of land by the sea. It occurs through washing up sand, soil, or silt. Erosion is the gradual washing away of land along the shoreline.
While erosion-accretion phenomena are natural, climate disasters and persisting low-pressure events that cause turbulent seas are increasing ecological imbalance, according to an OSDMA expert.
“When I married and came to the village, there were sand dunes stretching all the way,” remembered 46-year-old Mallika. “Now there’s hardly any beach left for dunes to stand; only the shore sands are rising higher.”
So close is the sea now that this year, 2023, even without any major low-pressure event, sea-water ingress has cut a 100-metre channel into pastureland on the village outskirt, Bhuyan added.
Oxford University research from across 52 sites worldwide on ‘nature-based solutions’ said coastal forest walls, mangroves and coral reefs cause waves to break before they hit the shore or ingress towards human habitats, lowering both the force and height of the swell and in the process reducing the likelihood of the sea breaching over into people’s land.
The study found that natural habitats were 2-5 times more cost-effective than engineered structures, like the geotextile tube installed in another affected district in Odisha, which was in tatters within 10 years. These (like Tandahara’s bio-wall) can help to protect from climate change impacts while slowing further warming (by carbon sequestration), supporting biodiversity, and securing ecosystem services, researchers widely believe.
Of Bulls, Goats and Other Challenges
As the Bay of Bengal became a hotspot for tropical storms and waves inched closer to Tandahara, coating salty mist day and night on everything, their staple rice crops began failing. Employable males migrated out.
Left behind with children and ageing parents to make ends meet were again the women. They began goat-keeping. The 108 households have no less than 500 goats today.
One adult goat weighing 15kg can easily fetch up to INR 8000 (USD 96.3), extra during festive seasons.
Handsome returns, yes, but also the biggest daily menace to women’s Casuarina walls.
“Until saplings are at least 5 feet tall and out of reach of the ever-hungry goats, we need to protect them. We patrol in groups of three, morning and afternoon,” elderly Harkamani Swain said.
A woman goat herder confines her grazing cattle to the grass on the farms’ boundaries, away from the fresh Casuarina plantations, to avoid cash penalties. Credit: Manipadma Jena/IPS In the afternoon, with household chores done, women retreat to relax and bond under the cool forest’s shade. Credit: Manipadma Jena/IPS Every morning, taking turns, one group meets at the village temple to decide on patrolling responsibilities. Credit: Manipadma Jena/IPS Cyclone Phailin in 2013 wrought maximum damage and loss of life as rural settlements had only mud-walled, thatched-roofed homes. A woman stands desolately, having lost her home and belongings to the storm in Bhubaneswar. Credit: Manipadma Jena/IPS
Rout walks on purposefully; it’s difficult to keep up with her, traversing over uneven abandoned paddy fields. She is going to check if any goats or the village bull have walked in to nibble at the new saplings planted under the government’s forestry scheme earlier in August this year when rains came.
If she espies the bull amidst the plants, she’ll holler, and the women will rush and help chase it out.
“If cattle destroy the plants, their owners have to pay a 100 rupees (USD 1.2) penalty, Rout explains, sighing in relief on seeing no intruder. “To get a hungry bull off the plantation requires more than one woman. If a help call is shouted out, but the group member whose house is closest does not respond, they are charged 100 rupees as well,” she explains how strict community rules have helped them grow the tree wall.
Seeing their zeal, in 2000, the forestry officials mentored them to form a village Forest Protection Committee. They were provided, one-time and free of cost, several large party-sized ironware pots worth 60,000 rupees (USD 722.8) to rent out to village events and maintain bank funds.
“Were this active group not been looking after the coastal forest, even when the government plants and sometimes waters them too, they would not remain alive beyond a month. There is a strong sense of ownership instilled within them. With them, we have a true partnership,” a local supervisory-level government forest official told IPS, wishing not to be named as they were not allowed to speak to the media.
Green Walls Provide Direct and Indirect Income for an Entire Village
When forest officials came with saplings this monsoon, the nearby beach was littered with dead Casuarina stumps and branches left from an earlier storm and proliferating beach creepers. The women’s group offered to clear the large stretches. In return, they got to take home the dead wood.
“With the thinner branches, we were able to repair seaside fences,” Kanaka Behera told IPS. The official would otherwise have hired contractors’ men on wages. “We take ownership of the storm walls. We will patrol till the saplings are grown.”
Dead trees get used for roof beams of thatched cattle sheds and for firewood, fulfilling needs in rural households. Odisha government, since the 2013 Phailin storm, has provided concrete-roofed, brick-walled disaster-resilient houses within 5 km of high tide.
Under the thick canopy of Casuarinas, a rotting pile of hay lies in a corner. The women can grow two mushroom crops here from early July to late August. The dense thicket obstructs damaging rain directly falling on the delicate fungi; high humidity is just right for bountiful harvests, which income goes into the group’s bank account, used when members need funds urgently.
Rout points further afield at over 25 green net-cloth-covered betel vine bowers just behind the Casuarina thicket. The 8-feet high square bamboo bowers, locally called ‘bareja’, are shading structures creating a green-house environment for better quality betel leaves. It can fetch a good income but is a fragile cultivation. “Those ‘barejas’ stand because this thick line of Casuarinas stands against strong winds that can easily bring the structures down and deprive a quarter of our village households of their livelihood,” she said.
Most afternoons, with household chores and afternoon meals done, the women leave the village behind to sit in the quiet under the trees. Sometimes, they laugh together, sing even if tunelessly, as the birds call from the branches, used to their presence.
“These trees are today like our grown-up sons; they stand strong here, ready to protect us, giving us confidence and moments of contentment,” says the elderly Bengalata Rout, whose only son Ritu, 40 years old, is working as a computer clerk thousands of kilometres away in Surat in western India, holding on to a deeply grooved tree trunk. A widow, she lives with her daughter-in-law and two little grandsons.
Powerful Agents of Change United in Fighting More Than Just the Storms and Seas
The water from the borewells in Tandahara became progressively so salty that children, no matter how thirsty, would often refuse to drink. Water carried from the small groundwater pit never sufficed. Forced to drink increasingly salty water, stomach upset, nausea and skin irritation have become chronic.
Bonding together for the tree barrier has, over the years, given the women of Tandahara a sense of unity and empowerment, and they are changing the collective traditional mindset of the village as well.
Post-pandemic, taking the poor drinking water issue into their own hands, the traditionally village-bound women marched to the local-level government officer with bottles of the salty water they got from hand pumps and asked the officer to drink it. The officer was shocked at the confrontation from a group of village women but finally admitted the water was undrinkable and ordered water tankers to deliver to the village.
Water is, however, supplied only in April and May, peak summer months when local water turns saltier. Again, it is limited to daily just two buckets per household, even for large families. On repeated visits by the women, administration higher-ups even visited the village five months back, promised piped water, but work is yet to begin, said 29-year-old Gouri Padhi, who has been in school up to class ten and is more educated than the others.
Looking Ahead
“Communities already have the agency to adapt and make decisions in the face of change,” said the Global Resilience Partnership Report 2023, but often need support in the form of appropriate data, knowledge, information, and resources to further strengthen adaptation and resilience actions.
“As climate and other shocks become more frequent, severe and overlapping, it is urgent to become smarter and faster when it comes to building resilience,” Dina Esposito, Assistant to the Administrator for the Bureau for Resilience and Food Security, told IPS via email. “At USAID, we’re bringing innovative solutions, such as shock response monitoring systems, to build resilience and to measure impact so that we can learn and adapt as we go.”
For the women of Tandahara, resilience is found in their collective efforts to save their village.
While murmurs are growing stronger among elderly men to step back from the advancing sea and resettle their homes at a safe distance. Two neighbouring villages have already left, illegally squatting on forest land, they point out.
“True, whenever the winds wail, my heart palpitates with dread; I think today all will end. When the government mobile alerts shriek, we flee to the two-storied storm shelter with our cattle. But we will not abandon our ancestral village,” Rout says firmly. “We will do whatever it takes to make it safer, but we will not leave,” she echoes her group’s stand on this crucial issue. Many of the younger generation youth listening nod in agreement.
The figure represents nearly 10 per cent of global Gross Domestic Product (GDP), according to the 2023 edition of The State of Food and Agriculture (SOFA) – the agency’s flagship report – which covers 154 countries.
Acknowledgment and action
It introduces the concept of the hidden costs and benefits of agrifood systems, offering a framework through which they can be assessed.
The aim is to help decision makers steer global agrifood systems – the whole industry encompassing food and non-food agricultural production – towards greater sustainability.
“In the face of escalating global challenges: food availability, food accessibility and food affordability; climate crisis; biodiversity loss; economic slowdowns and downturns; worsening poverty; and other overlapping crises, the future of our agrifood systems hinges on our willingness to appreciate all food producers, big or small, to acknowledge these true costs, and understand how we all contribute to them, and what actions we need to take,” saidFAO Director-General Dongyu Qu.
Unhealthy diets, emissions and poverty
The report found that the biggest hidden costs, more than 70 percent, are driven by unhealthy diets that are high in ultra-processed foods, fats and sugars, leading to obesity and non-communicable diseases, and causing labour productivity losses. This is particularly the case in richer countries.
One fifth of the total costs are environment-related, from greenhouse gas and nitrogen emissions, land-use change and water use, with all countries affected.
Meanwhile, low-income countries are proportionately the hardest hit by hidden costs of agrifood systems, which represent more than a quarter of their GDP, compared to less than 12 percent in middle-income countries and less than eight percent in high-income countries.
Hidden costs associated with poverty and undernourishment are also the most significant in these nations.
More analysis needed
The report calls for more regular and detailed analysis by governments and the private sector of the hidden or “true” costs of agrifood systems through true cost accounting, followed by action.
Although there have been previous attempts at measurement, the FAO report is the first to disaggregate these costs down to the national level and ensure they are comparable across cost categories and between countries.
‘A call to action’
The UN agency will dedicate two consecutive editions of the SOFA report to the same theme, marking a first. The current report presents initial estimates, while the 2024 edition will focus on in-depth targeted assessments to identify the best ways to mitigate them such as through taxation, subsidies, and legislation.
FAO has urged governments to use “true cost” accounting to transform agrifood systems to address the climate crisis, poverty, inequality and food security, which will require investment and innovations in areas such as research, data collection and capacity building.
“I hope that this report will serve as a call to action for all partners – from policymakers and private-sector actors to researchers and consumers – and inspire a collective commitment to transform our agrifood systems for the betterment of all,” said Mr. Qu.
The recent launch of the UN-led AI Advisory Body advanced a growing global trend to harness machine learning to find solutions to common challenges. AI is upping the data crunching game and a growing number of governments, businesses and civil society partners are working together to reap its many benefits.
That includes speeding up and scaling efforts to realize such global ambitions as the 2030 Agenda and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which serve as the world’s blueprint to make the planet greener, cleaner and fairer.
Ahead of the latest UN Climate Change Conference (COP 28), which begins at the end of November in Dubai, UN News looks at how AI helps the world, from communities to corporations to law makers, tackle climate change:
UN Photo/Elma Okic
Artificial intelligence can contribute to fighting climate change and supporting progress towards all the SDGs.
Weather
AI-driven technologies offer previously unheard-of capabilities to process enormous volumes of data, extract insightful knowledge and improve predictive models, according to the UN’s World Meteorological Organization (WMO).
That means improved modelling and predicting climate change patterns that can help communities and authorities to draft effective adaptation and mitigation strategies.
Several UN agencies support vulnerable communities in Burundi, Chad and Sudan through an AI-driven project to investigate past environmental change around displacement hotspots and deliver future projections to inform adaptation measures and anticipatory action for integration in humanitarian programming.
On the ground, enhanced data can be a game-changer. For instance, the MyAnga app helps Kenyan pastoralists brace for drought. With data from global meteorological stations and satellites sent to their mobile phones, herders can plan ahead, better manage their livestock and save hours of scouting for green pastures.
United Nations
SDG 13
Strengthen resilience and adaptation to climate-related hazards and natural disasters
Integrate climate change measures into national policies, strategies and planning
Improve education, awareness-raising, and human and institutional capacity on climate change mitigation, adaption, impact reduction and early warning
Raise capacity for effective climate change-related planning and management in least developed countries
The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is the primary international, intergovernmental forum for negotiating the global response to climate change.
Disaster prevention
As extreme weather events unfold with more frequency and intensity, AI can help communities around the world to better brace for climate disasters.
AI-driven initiatives are targeting high-risk areas and feeding into local and national response plans. For areas susceptible to landslides, for example, mapping can help local authorities plan and implement sustainable development measures, reduce risks and ensure the safety of residents in vulnerable communities.
Related developments in AI and robotics were among the tools identified in a recent project led by WMO, UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and International Telecommunication Union (ITU). From enhancing accuracy in weather forecasts to reducing disaster risks, AI is already helping, according to WMO, which operates a disaster risk reduction programme and multi-hazard early warning system that serves countries, communities and humanitarian agencies.
Leveraging AI’s benefits is also part of the UN Secretary-General’s groundbreaking Early Warnings for All initiative. Launched earlier this year, the its action plan aims to ensure everyone on Earth is protected from hazardous weather, water or climate events through early warning systems by the end of 2027.
Artificial intelligence can support early warning systems to mitigate the effects of extreme weather events.
Tracking pollution
Ever wonder where urban air quality reports come from? Cities around the world already track pollution to alert the public in cases of dangerous levels.
Using AI, susceptibility maps can support local governments in making decisions to improve public health and urban resilience.
In addition, AI can improve urban planning as well as traffic and waste management, making cities more sustainable and liveable.
Carbon neutrality
AI can revolutionize the world’s approach to carbon neutrality and usher in an era of intelligent sustainability on a global scale at a time when the race is on to keep Earth from heating up to dangerous levels.
As a critical catalyst in realizing global carbon neutrality goals, AI’s algorithms have a key role to play in minimizing environmental impact and maximizing efficiency.
In terms of realizing the global goal for affordable and clean energy for all by 2030 (SDG 7), AI can optimize grids and increase the efficiency of renewable sources. Predictive maintenance using AI can also reduce downtime in energy production. That can mean reducing the planet’s carbon footprint.
United Nations
SDG 7
Increase share of renewable energy globally
Double global rate of improvement in energy efficiency
Expand infrastructure and upgrade technology for supplying modern, sustainable energy services
Enhance international cooperation to facilitate access to clean energy research and technology, including renewable energy, energy efficiency and advanced and cleaner fossil-fuel technology
International funding for clean energy in developing countries has dropped to just $10.8 billion in 2021 from a peak of $26.4 billion in 2017.
Fast fashion
As an industry with a record of high emissions, fashion can benefit from AI-driven research and development to accelerate innovation. The $2.4 trillion-dollar global industry that employs approximately 300 million people across the value chain, many of whom are women, and the scale of the industry is only expected to grow over the coming years.
Given its size and global reach, unsustainable practices within the fashion sector have important impacts on social and environmental development indicators, and without major changes to production processes and consumption patterns in fashion, the social and environmental costs of the sector will continue to mount, according to the UN Alliance for Sustainable Fashion.
That’s where AI can step in. Machine learning can optimize supply chains to reduce waste, monitor resource consumption and promote sustainable manufacturing processes. AI can help to accelerate the energy transition by optimizing savings and improving efficiency across energy-intensive sectors.
The fashion industry is a major contributor to harmful emissions.
Fast food
Likewise with agriculture, another emissions-heavy sector. It accounts for 22 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, according to a UN climate assessment report, but AI-driven efforts can change that.
From corporations to small-scale farmers facing extreme weather events, water scarcity and land degradation, AI can help optimize their practices, reduce waste and minimize the environmental impact of food production. AI-driven smart grids can balance supply and demand, facilitating the integration of renewables into energy systems and reducing the reliance on fossil fuels.
This year’s Science and Innovation Forum, held in mid-October, focused on climate action. Hosted by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the week-long event showcased examples of technologies that aim to transform traditional practices into data-driven systems that protect people and the planet.
Among them, AI and digital tools are pivotal in building climate-resilient agrifood systems that are more efficient, sustainable and adaptable to climate change challenges, according to the agency.
The AI for Good NEURAL NETWORK | AI-powered Networking Community Platform | Learn, Build & Connect
UN on AI
The UN has been exploring ways to leverage the potential of AI to drive change and impact across their issue areas. Here are just a few:
The UN System’s Chief Executives Board for Coordination (CEB) and its High-Level Committee on Programmes (HLCP) established in 2020 the interagency working group on AI (IAWGAI), which is co-led by ITU and UNESCO.
The AI for Good platform, organized by ITU in partnership with 40 UN sister agencies, launched the Neural Network, an AI-powered community networking and content platform designed to help users build connections with innovators and experts. It also links innovative ideas with social impact opportunities.
ITU is working to identify gaps in UN AI-related activities in order to help the UN system prioritize strategic actions.
Multiple UN agencies are driving new competitions to find the best ways to advance climate action with AI. The winning entries will debut at COP 28 in late November. Learn more about the competitions here.
These sites promote biodiversity conservation with sustainable use and are located across 134 countries, with 21 new reserves added in the past two years alone.
The rapid expansion of this network testifies to the growing awareness that our common future depends upon reconciling lifestyle with greater respect for nature, said Audrey Azoulay, Director-General of UN cultural agency, UNESCO, marking the International Day for Biosphere Reserves.
Tackling common challenges
“On this day, we celebrate the diversity of these sites: their resilience, the knowledge they generate and the example they set – for instance, through their support for the green economy, or their use of renewable energy sources,” she said.
“We celebrate the potential of biosphere reserves to tackle the great challenge of our times: making peace with the natural world. In this respect, biosphere reserves have much to offer.”
Biosphere reserves are not conventional protected areas but are places where over 275 million people live and work.
These sites exist wherever humans interact with nature and range in size from a single, small island community to vast, ecological corridors stretching across continents. They are also home to many indigenous peoples, who have essential understanding and knowledge of the Earth.
One example is the Serengeti-Ngorongoro Biosphere Reserve in Tanzania, which covers a surface area of more than 4.3 million hectares.
It includes the Serengeti National Park and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and supports hundreds of thousands of animals such as wildebeest, gazelles, giraffes, cheetahs, leopards and antelopes. The reserve is also home to the indigenous Maasai people.
Reset and re-invent
“In these biosphere reserves, people reset and reinvent their relationship with the environment in tangible ways – by considering biodiversity conservation and sustainable development as compatible, mutually dependent goals,” said Ms. Azoulay.
Furthermore, their potential is driven by young people in particular, many of whom participate in UNESCO efforts to promote harmony with the natural world, she said.
Ms. Azoulay ended her message by inviting people everywhere to visit a biosphere reserve.
“You are sure to experience places that are truly remarkable, not only because they are home to natural wonders – but also because they are home to extraordinary people,” she said.
Kashmir’s apple industry has been devasted by unusual weather patterns that are blamed on climate change. Credit: Umer Asif/IPS
by Umar Manzoor Shah (shopian, india)
Inter Press Service
SHOPIAN, INDIA, Nov 02 (IPS) – Of Kashmir’s seven million inhabitants, a staggering one million rely directly on apple farming. The region is pivotal in India’s apple and horticulture production, contributing to over 70 percent of the country’s apple supply. This not only provides income to farmers but also sustains a vast network of laborers, traders, and transporters within the fruit economy.
However, this year paints a grim picture for the apple industry. Drastic fluctuations in weather patterns, including unseasonal rainfall and unexpected temperature surges, have left apple farmers in a state of deep concern and distress.
In the southern region of Shopian, renowned for its high-quality apple exports, farmers lament the sharp decline in production, considering this trend as a severe threat to their livelihoods.
Perturbed Orchardists
Abdul Karim Mir is one such farmer from the area. His apple orchard is spread over three acres. This year, his produce dipped drastically due to the late arrival of summer and a sudden increase in temperatures when autumn was nearing. “There are scores of apple growers like me who used to be excited about the harvest as it would provide us with immense profits and wider appreciation. The Kashmiri apples are world-famous. There are few pesticides and chemical sprays used for their growth. They are extremely delicious and nutritious. But now, the tale seems different,” Mir told IPS.
He says last year, his orchard produced more than 500 boxes of apples. However, this year, says Mir, the count is not more than 300.
“This is because the bloom at the onset of spring didn’t happen on time. The temperatures were not more than 10 degrees when they should have been more than 20. And at the end of the summer, which is the month of August and September, the temperatures surged suddenly. This had a direct impact on the crop. The productivity plummeted, and so did our hopes of a profitable harvest,” Mir said.
Ghulam Rasool Bhat, another apple farmer from central Kashmir’s Ganderbal, says the situation for the apple growers due to climate change in Kashmir is becoming dismal.
“I estimate around 50 percent of loss this year. Even when we are plucking the fruit from the trees, the loss is of such a magnitude. Now imagine, when we load them in trucks for export, how much more produce will be lost during the transition period,” Bhat said.
He adds that though the government has launched a few schemes for apple growers that include subsidized fertilizers and facilitation of storage, climate change is leaving production in tatters.
Bhat says the cold wave grips Kashmir valley in the months of May and June; otherwise, the summer months when fruits normally grow in the region are fine. “Then, in the first week of September, Kashmir recorded the hottest day of summer. The temperatures were recorded at 34.2°C. Such scorching heat was last recorded 53 years ago. This is unprecedented. It damaged the apple crop beyond repair,” he added.
Horticulture is considered the backbone of Kashmir’s economy, and there are an estimated 144,825 hectares of land dedicated to apple-growing in the region. The industry annually produces 1.7 million tons of apples, and their exports have been valued at INR 6000 crore (USD 826,860,000).
Heat Wave Wreaks Havoc
Apart from India, the relentless grip of global heat waves has unleashed a series of environmental crises across the globe. Canada and Hawaii have experienced intensified wildfires, while South America, Japan, Europe, and the United States have been subjected to extreme heat waves.
According to the American space agency NASA, our planet has witnessed the hottest June to August period on record this year. It marked the hottest summer ever recorded in the Northern Hemisphere, contrasting with the warmest winter in the Southern Hemisphere.
NASA’s data reveals that the months of June, July, and August were a staggering 0.23 degrees Celsius warmer than any previous summer in their records and a scorching 1.2 degrees Celsius warmer than the average summer temperatures observed between 1951 and 1980.
These alarming trends have been attributed to the emission of greenhouse gases, which stand as a significant driver behind climate change and the global warming phenomenon responsible for the extreme conditions we witnessed during this sweltering summer.
In the year 2016, India’s northern state of Rajasthan experienced an unprecedented heatwave, with temperatures soaring to a staggering 51 degrees Celsius in the scorching month of May, breaking all previous records. Tragically, this extreme heatwave claimed the lives of an estimated 1,000 people in the state due to dehydration and hyperthermia. In the same year, the southern states of India also withstood the worst of the relentless heatwave, resulting in the tragic loss of 800 lives.
At the UN Climate Change Conference (COP24) in December 2015, a report from the World Health Organization (WHO) emphasized the urgent need for India to address climate change. The report highlighted that both India and China stand to gain substantial health benefits from tackling climate change, with potential gains estimated at a remarkable USD3.28-8.4 trillion for India alone.
Furthermore, the report revealed that the value of health improvements resulting from climate action would be twice the cost of global mitigation policies. This benefit-to-cost ratio is even more favorable for countries like China and India.
Government data indicates that the persistent drought and rising temperatures have adversely affected more than 330 million people in India. Research conducted by the Joint Global Change Research Institute and Battelle Memorial Institute, Pacific Northwest Division, underscores that climate change will disproportionately impact the country’s marginalized communities. These communities, often lacking financial resources and adequate education, rely on agriculture for their sustenance and livelihood. Under the looming threat of climate change, their options are severely limited, leading to increased vulnerability.
The research also warns that in a country prone to natural disasters, the well-being of those affected, particularly those with limited means to recover, will become a significant factor under climate change. This could potentially lead to political instability, strain public budgets, and foster social unrest.
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