West Africa is 'ground zero' for climate change: UN official

AllAfrica.com, via UN Integrated Regional Information Networks: The Sahel region of West Africa is "ground zero" for vulnerable communities struggling to adapt to climate change, the UN Secretary-General's Special Adviser on conflict, Jan Egeland, said on 2 June in Ouagadougou, capital of Burkina Faso, as he began a mission to draw the world's attention to mounting social pressures in the region. "Many of the people here live on the edge even in normal times, so if there will be dramatic climate change as many predict, they will go over the cliff if there is no investment in adaptation," he said.

In addition to Burkina Faso, Egeland, who was the UN's Emergency Relief Coordinator from 2003 to 2006, will visit the capitals of Mali and Niger, and travel to Lake Chad in eastern Niger on the border with Nigeria and Chad, and Lake Saguibine in northern Mali. Both were once vast lakes that have since evaporated to become arid desert.

Egeland said the Sahel, a mostly landlocked region of over 15 million inhabitants in west and central Africa, is facing a "lethal mix" of threats including climate change, rising food prices and the trafficking of arms and drugs into and via the region. He said he will be urging governments in the region to cooperate more effectively in dealing with climate change….

Traditional medicines in Ouagadougou, photo by Ferdinand Reus from Arnhem, Holland, from Wikimedia Commons, under Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.0 License (cc-by-sa-2.0)