Diabetes is a 'time bomb' in the Arctic

Jane George in Nunatsiaq Online: Diabetes is a ticking “time bomb” in the Arctic, says a public health expert at this week’s conference on climate change and pollution in the Arctic in Copenhagen. That’s because the persistant organic pollutants found in the meat and blubber of marine mammals, like pilot whales, beluga and narwhal, are linked to the development of diabetes, said Philippe Grandjean from the University of Southern Denmark and the Harvard School of Public Health.

These man-made pollutants originate far to the south, where they’re used in agriculture and industry. But they’re widely found in the Arctic. Previous studies have shown that these pollutants can impair the intelligence, reflexes and immune systems of children. Now, new research from the Faroe Islands also links these POPs to diabetes later in life.

The increasing prevalence of adult onset or type 2 diabetes, a chronic disease that occurs when the body can’t process the sugars in food properly, has been linked primarily to obesity and lack of exercise. Depending on its severity, diabetes can lead to blindness, kidney failure, heart disease and sometimes even death.

Grandjean’s study, detailed in the May edition of Epidemiology, found that elderly Faroese with a life-long diet high in pilot whale meat and blubber run a much higher risk of developing diabetes, “in some cases more clearly in women.”…

From the Robert N. Dennis collection of stereoscopic views, "Our Alaskan Sisters up in the Klondike Country," around 1898

Ignoring corruption in climate adaptation could cost lives

More on that Transparency International report on corruption, from Megan Rowling in AlertNet: Adapting to the impacts of climate change will bring heightened corruption risks as increasing amounts of money flow into infrastructure projects, aid for weather-related disasters and help for people leaving inhospitable environments, says a new report from Transparency International (TI).

None of the 20 countries judged to be most vulnerable to climate change - mainly in Africa and South Asia - scores higher than 3.6 on TI's annual corruption perceptions index, in which 0 is extremely corrupt and 10 is very clean, according to the "Global Corruption Report" from the Berlin-based anti-graft group.

"Broader systems of governance need to be strengthened in many countries where adaptation is needed most," it argues. Effective governance of adaptation activities will require setting up national bodies to manage and monitor spending and combining them with functioning courts, law enforcement and a vigorous media and civil society, the watchdog says.

Its 400-page report teases out the pressure points for corruption in measures designed to help poorer nations cope with rising seas and more extreme weather patterns linked to climate change.

It identifies construction as one of the riskiest areas due to the large-scale infrastructure deemed necessary to protect people from climate change impacts, including flood walls, drainage systems and storm shelters. The annual costs of such work could top $100 billion by 2030, the report notes.

"It is of particular concern that the construction industry, long considered among the most corrupt industrial sectors, will be entrusted with reducing human vulnerability," writes James Lewis, principal of the architectural practice Datum International and a visiting fellow at Bath University….

Indonesia railway bridge across the Kali Kanci under construction 1914-1915, Wikimedia Commons via the Tropenmuseum Collection

A global adaptation index

PR Newswire: During its first Annual Meeting this week in Washington, D.C., the Global Adaptation Institute announced that it is moving into a new phase in the development of the Global Adaptation Index™ (GaIn™). Adaptation experts, governmental dignitaries, and think tanks gathered to evaluate and make recommendations on world progress on Adaptation to climate change and other global forces.

GaIn™ is a metric which measures two main concepts: 1. the vulnerability of a country to the effects of climate change and other global forces and 2. the readiness of a country to successfully implement Adaptation solutions. "We are guided by the maxim - That which cannot be measured cannot be improved," said Dr. Ian Noble, the Chief Scientist of the Institute. GaIn™ will include indicators designed to accelerate private sector investment in Adaptation initiatives and encourage governments and civil society to ramp up their efforts on this issue. This development phase will include consultation with scientists, investors, policymakers, and representatives of NGOs and think tanks.

Preservation of agriculture, water and coastal protection are more present than ever in the budgets of countries and in the board room discussions of large corporations. Smaller enterprises as well as civil society organizations are also learning to cope with the effects of climate change and accelerated changes to the environment.

"Ultimately, it is about vulnerable people in society; those that for several reasons cannot yet take destiny into their own hands," said former Managing Director of the World Bank and Founding CEO of the Global Adaptation Institute, Dr. Juan Jose Daboub.

…The Global Adaptation Institute will also use GaIn™ to identify, fund, and rapidly implement high-impacting Adaptation projects, the results of which, will help refine and update GaIn™ for years to come….

Researchers propose whole-system redesign of US agriculture

Seed Daily: Transformative changes in markets, policy and science, rather than just incremental changes in farming practices and technology, will be critical if the United States is to achieve long-term sustainability in agriculture, according to a nationwide team of agriculturists that includes a University of California, Davis, animal scientist.

The team's recommendations, first published as a 2010 report by the U.S. National Research Council, appear as a Policy Forum piece in the May 6 issue of the journal Science. Lead author on the paper is John Reganold, Regents Professor of soil science and agroecology at Washington State University, Pullman.

"For decades, the agricultural industry, research community and government, have looked to incremental improvements in agricultural procedures and technologies for achieving advances in productivity," said Deanne Meyer, a Cooperative Extension livestock waste management specialist in the UC Davis Department of Animal Science and a member of the research team.

She noted that such incremental improvements have included adoption of two-year crop rotations, precision agriculture technologies, classically bred and genetically engineered crops, and reduced- or no-tillage management systems.

"While all of these have resulted in important improvements, it's become apparent that as modern agriculture also grapples with important issues such as global climate change, biodiversity, resource conservation and public health problems, a more transformative approach is needed," she said.

Such an approach would balance production goals with long-term sustainability concerns involving the environmental, social and economic impacts of agriculture. It would focus on a "whole-system redesign" that would address policy and market issues, as well as technological issues, the researchers recommend in their report…

Field of ripening intermediate wheatgrass (Thinopyrum intermedium) at the Land Institute's research farm in Salina, Kansas. Shot by Dehaan, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States license

Agencies, insurers look at coastal areas

Robb Fulcher in Easy Reader News: Insurers have been trying to anticipate the danger of flooding, wildfire and drought in coastal areas, which could accompany climate change from greenhouse gas emissions and other factors, a researcher told a symposium co-sponsored by the City of Hermosa Beach.

A number of scientists, including Nobel Prize winners, told how government agencies, researchers and private-sector organizations are attempting to plan for deeply uncertain scenarios presaged by climate-change research, at the Monday symposium held at the sprawling Northrop Grumman plant in Redondo Beach.

…Sean B. Hecht, executive director of the UCLA Environmental Law Center, said Lloyd’s of London and other large “re-insurers” — which insure the insurance companies against losses — are mulling possible coastal effects of climate change including wildfires, and flooding and storms from rising sea levels. Insurers drive much of our behavior, Hecht said, because investments cannot be made, businesses cannot be launched and developments cannot be built unless they can be insured.

But, he said, insurers cannot be counted on to discourage risky behavior. Government regulators aim to keep insurance affordable, which can encourage possibly risky actions such as dense development in attractive coastal areas and “serial rebuilding” in areas that see regular flooding, Hecht said.

Entities willing to plan for possible effects of climate change include water agencies such as the Metropolitan Water District, which are required to prepare long-term plans for water availability, Robert J. Lempert, a scholar in the field of “decision making under conditions of deep uncertainty,” told the symposium.

…“Deep uncertainty” exists in climate change scenarios, Lempert said. He encourages long-range planners to “run their plans backwards,” identifying where they are vulnerable, determining what fixes could be made, and then studying the costs of the fixes….

A statue of a surfer in Hermosa Beach, shot by Christophe.Finot, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license

Rich nations miss UN climate finance deadline

Alister Doyle in Reuters: Rich countries have missed a U.N. deadline for outlining aid to help developing nations combat climate change. Among industrialized nations, only Russia and Ukraine sent letters to the United Nations by the May 1 deadline -- only to say they did not feel obliged to contribute under a deal to provide almost $30 billion in initial "fast-start" climate funds from 2010-12.

The lack of response is a setback to the deal, under which aid is meant to rise to $100 billion a year by 2020. "There are too many empty multilateral accounts," said Colin Beck, representative of the Solomon Islands at the United Nations.

"Developed countries continue to teeter in honoring even their modest commitments," said Clifford Polycarp, of the Washington-based World Resources Institute, which tracks climate aid pledges.

At a meeting of almost 200 nations in Cancun, Mexico, in December, industrialized nations agreed to give details of their first fast-start funds by May 2011 as part of a wider deal that included a plan to set up a Green Climate Fund.

The website of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat, which oversees commitments, only has letters from Moscow and Kiev. It spells out that it interprets "by May" to mean "by May 1." But deadlines set by U.N. agencies are often flexible and rich nations are expected to submit details soon, Polycarp said.

The cash is meant to help developing nations curb their rising greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to the impacts of climate change, ranging from more droughts to rising sea levels….

The Fight of the Moneybags and the Coffers, by Pieter van der Heyden, 1558

Vatican science panel calls attention to the threat of glacial melt

Science Daily: A panel of some of the world's leading climate and glacier scientists co-chaired by a Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego researcher issued a report commissioned by the Vatican's Pontifical Academy of Sciences citing the moral imperative before society to properly address climate change.

The co-authors of "Fate of Mountain Glaciers in the Anthropocene" list numerous examples of glacial decline around the world and the evidence linking that decline to human-caused changes in climate and air pollution. The threat to the ways of life of people dependent upon glaciers and snow packs for water supplies compels immediate action to mitigate the effects of climate change and to adapt to what changes are happening now and are projected to happen in the future.

"We are committed to ensuring that all inhabitants of this planet receive their daily bread, fresh air to breathe and clean water to drink as we are aware that, if we want justice and peace, we must protect the habitat that sustains us," the authors write in a declaration prefacing the report. "The believers among us ask God to grant us this wish."

Scripps Climate and Atmospheric Scientist Veerabhadran Ramanathan co-chaired the working group with Nobel Laureate Paul Crutzen, formerly affiliated with Scripps and Lennart Bengtsson, former head of the European weather forecasting center.

…"The widespread loss of snow and ice in the mountain glaciers is one of the most visible changes attributable to global climate change. The disintegration of many small glaciers in the Himalayas is most disturbing to me since this region serves as the water tower of Asia and since both the greenhouse gases and air pollutants like soot and ozone contribute to the melting," said Ramanathan, who has been a member of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences since 2004.

…Though scientists usually refrain from proposing action, Ramanathan said the circumstances warranted advancing suggestions from the working group. The authors recommend pursuit of three measures: immediate reduction of worldwide carbon dioxide emissions, reduction of concentrations of warming air pollutants such as soot, ozone, methane and hydroflurocarbons by up to 50 percent, and preparation to adapt to climate changes that society will not be able to mitigate….

From NASA, this astronaut photograph highlights the northern approach to Mount Everest from Tibet

Warming blamed for 6 percent rise in food prices

Eric Berger in my SA (Texas): As the planet warmed during the past three decades, rising temperatures reduced the yield of corn and wheat crops, and contributed a modest increase to the price of food, researchers have found. Although the effects of climate change aren’t devastating — they’re estimated to be responsible for about a 6 percent rise in food prices since 1980 — scientists say future changes to crops could be more adverse as the planet continues to warm.

“If we don’t adapt, I think we are just beginning to see the effects of climate change on agriculture,” said David Lobell, a Stanford University scientist who led the research published Thursday in the journal Science. The authors of the study, one of the first to link climate change to agricultural losses, urged farmers to adapt by developing types of corn and wheat that can grow in warmer and drier climates.

That may be a tough sell for American farmers, who so far have been largely spared by climate change and in general remain skeptical about the threats posed by global warming…. The skepticism may be partly due to the fact the U.S. has experienced less warming than other parts of the world during the past century.

As part of the new study, in fact, researchers found no effect on U.S. crop production from climate change. But the effects were quite significant elsewhere. Russia, in contrast, lost an estimated 15 percent of wheat production due to climate change.

“My message to American farmers would be to be careful not to think that what you’re experiencing is going on in the world,” Lobell said. “In a sense our findings help me understand why farmers are so skeptical about climate change, because they haven't been seeing it themselves. But when you look around the world it's very apparent.”…

A 1948 photo of a carrot harvest, from the Agricultural Communications Office of the Texas Agricultural Extension Service

Global climate change affects tropical as well as polar regions

David Gable in Environment News Network: The most often heard victims of climate change are the polar bears in the far north losing their hunting grounds to the melting polar ice. Maps show the greatest area of warming temperatures are at the north and south poles. However, equally important are the effects of climate change in the tropical regions of the world. As temperatures rise here, poorly adaptable species may be lost forever. It may also encourage the spread of diseases and unprecedented heat waves which may lead to forest fires.

Studies of climate changes effects in the tropics have been conducted by William Laurance, Distinguished Research Professor at James Cook University in Queensland, Australia. His research has covered the entire world, from the Amazon to Africa, to tropical Australia. He notes prior research conducted by biologist, Justin Welbergen, who made observations on an Australian day where temperatures reached 42.9 degrees C (109 F). The extreme heat caused the deaths of 1,453 flying foxes along the northeastern Australian coastline. Since then, tens of thousands more have died. Prior to 1994, few mass die-offs were ever recorded.

Tropical species are perfectly suited for their climate. There are no seasons like in the northern latitudes, so these species have never experienced any serious deviations in temperature. In the tropics the only way to experience different temperatures is to change elevation. Generally, the temperature drops 6 degrees C (11 F) for every thousand meters up. Therefore, tropical species are also perfectly suited for their elevation.

This means trouble for mountaintop species because they are effectively on an island and have nowhere else to go. As temperatures rise, these high elevation species will be the first in danger. Laurance's colleague, Steve Williams, has created a model which suggests that extinctions will increase if temperatures rise more than three degrees. If they rise by 5-6 degrees, most endemic life in north Queensland will be exterminated….

A male Red-winged Parrot at the Mareeba Wetlands, Queensland, Australia. Shot by David Cook Wildlife Photography, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

After a three-decade hiatus, sea-level rise may return to the US west coast

Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego: The West Coast of North America has caught a break that has left sea level in the eastern North Pacific Ocean steady during the last few decades, but there is evidence that a change in wind patterns may be occurring that could cause coastal sea-level rise to accelerate beginning this decade. That is the conclusion of researchers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego, who said that conditions dominated by cold surface waters along the West Coast could soon flip to an opposite state.

"There are indications that this is what might be happening right now," said Peter Bromirski, lead author of a study now in press in the Journal of Geophysical Research-Oceans, published by the American Geophysical Union.

Global sea level rose during the 20th Century at a rate of about two millimeters (.08 inches) per year. That rate increased by 50% during the 1990s to a global rate of three millimeters (.12 inches) per year, an uptick frequently linked to global warming. Rising sea level has consequences for coastal development, beach erosion and wetlands inundation. Higher sea levels could cause increased damage to coastal communities and beaches, especially during coincident high tides, storm surges and extreme wave conditions.

….Scientists date the current phase of a Pacific Ocean climate cycle called the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) to the mid- to late-1970s. The current "warm" phase is characterized by the upward movement, or upwelling, of cold water toward the surface along the West Coast. Despite a few El Niño-induced surges in sea level during that time, the coastal sea level trend has mostly been steady.

… The authors write that the characteristics of wind stress variability over the eastern North Pacific "recently reached levels not observed since before the mid-1970s regime shift. This change in wind stress patterns may be foreshadowing a PDO regime shift, causing an associated persistent change ...that will result in a concomitant resumption of sea level rise along the U.S. West Coast to global or even higher rates."

In the map on the left, satellite altimetry sea-level height estimates over an 18-year period show upward trends in the western Pacific Ocean that are much larger than the global rise rate, but virtually no rise off the West Coast. (Right) Tide gauge data at Seattle, San Francisco and San Diego show sea level along the Pacific coast rising at about the global rate from 1930 to about 1980, but scant rise or even a lowering of sea level over the past three decades that is consistent with altimetry. Large interannual fluctuations in the trends are associated with El Niño. Image credit: AGU

Heathland fires rage on across Britain

No, this is not a story from some tinderbox forest in the American west. From an article by Ben Mitchell and Mike Hornby in the Independent (UK): Hundreds of firefighters are continuing to battle heathland fires which have been burning in locations across the UK for several days. Royal Berkshire Fire and Rescue Service is still tackling heathland fires which broke out in the Swinley Forest area earlier in the week, while in Lancashire, crews continue to battle blazes in the West Pennine Moors.

Police investigating the Swinley Forest fire have arrested two youths on suspicion of arson. A Thames Valley Police spokesman said they were questioned about actions relating to an arson but it was not clear whether this was connected to Swinley Forest.

…Lancashire Fire Service said it hoped forecast rain would help stop the spread of moorland fires which had occupied the crews of 32 of the county's 39 fire stations for the best part of a week. Firefighters have now withdrawn from the scene at Bacup, in the southern Pennines, but a new blaze erupted in the early hours of today at Darwen, in the West Pennine Moors, the service said.

…Weather experts say that much-needed rain is expected to fall in areas of Scotland, Wales and North West England today but central and southern areas would have to wait until Saturday….

A less combustible moment at Hut Hill in Swinley Forest, shot by Andrew Smith, Wikimedia Commons via Geograph UK, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license

New method to monitor climate change in Tanzania in offing

Beatrice Philemon in IPP Media: A new methodology for monitoring climate change impact on coastal, or peri-urban areas, will help enhance Dar es Salaam's development strategies. The methodology will be developed by researchers from Italy’s Sapienza University, in collaboration with Ardhi University and the city council.

This was revealed recently by city council director Bakari Kingobi during a workshop on adapting to climate change in Dar es Salaam’s coastal areas with the support from the European Union (EU). This has come about after realising that people living in the city’s coastal areas have already experienced the impact of climate change such as salinization of shallow water wells, loss of land on the coastline and damage to aquatic breeding sites.

Apart from that, people lack awareness on the link between climate change and its impact on their livelihoods. So, there is a need to assess the impact of climate change with a view to raising public awareness on how to cope with it.

Sapienza University Prof Silvia Macchi noted that the city council and Ardhi University should collaborate with local communities to develop a comprehensive plan that would help them cope with climate change in the areas they lived.

“You have to explore changes in this city because people living in peri-urban or coastal areas and the natural resources in those areas will be affected most by climate change induced hazards, floods, sea level rise, drought and land slide,” she said….

From the Bundesarchiv via Wikimedia Commons, a Walter Dobbertin photo of the harbor in Dar es Salaam, sometime between 1906 and 1918

Migrating because of the weather

Eco-business via the Jakarta Post: Asia Development Bank (ADB) is preparing a report called “Climate Change and Migration in Asia and the Pacific”, which is scheduled to be completed in March. ADB has been looking into migration patterns in the Asia-Pacific region, seeking linkages to natural disasters such as flooding.

ADB recently held an online discussion regarding the report, hosting ADB’s Climate Change Program Coordination Unit chief Robert J. Dobias and Francois Gemenne, a research fellow at the Paris-based Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI). More than 40 participants across the Asia-Pacific region joined the discussion.

Dobias said the report took the position that climate-induced migration was currently a relatively minor driver of migration because motivations to move were myriad. “It may be best to consider climate-induced migrations within the context of migration, generally. However, being able to attribute migration to climate change may become important in the context of funding,” he said.

He said that while the report had taken a preliminary step by identifying areas that may be especially vulnerable to climate-induced migration, more refined work was needed. By focusing development assistance in areas of high vulnerability, people could build resilience in their communities, he added….

An aerial view of North Jakarta, shot by Amelia Guo, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license

Natural catastrophes lead to losses at reinsurer

My former employer, Swiss Re, reports a loss partly related to extreme weather: Swiss Re reports a net loss of USD 665 million for the first quarter of 2011, compared to a profit of USD 158 million in the same period of 2010. Property & Casualty was impacted by a very high level of natural catastrophe claims, including the earthquakes in Japan and New Zealand and the floods in Australia.

…Property & Casualty reported an operating loss of USD 1.2 billion, compared to an operating income of USD 259 million in the first quarter of 2010. This result was largely driven by natural catastrophe pre-tax losses of USD 2.3 billion. The combined ratio for Property & Casualty rose to 163.7% in the first quarter of 2011, compared to 109.4% in the prior-year period. The net impact from natural catastrophes on the combined ratio was 89.4 percentage points, which was 79.8 percentage points above the expected level.

…Historically, large losses from natural disasters have been followed by price increases and stronger demand in the Property & Casualty market. Swiss Re believes the combination of the recent natural catastrophes, very low interest rates, and years of price declines are likely to bring forward the turn in the cycle….

Report offers strategies for San Francisco Bay to adapt

Kelly Zito in the San Francisco Chronicle: The Bay Area must start prepping for the whens, not the ifs, of climate change - like building cooling centers for use during heat waves, propping up homes on stilts in flood-prone areas and even abandoning roadways vulnerable to sea-level rise, according to an influential urban policy organization.

In a dramatic new tack that emphasizes adaptation over prevention, the San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association is recommending in a report to be released today that officials in the nine-county region begin making concrete plans for the economic, environmental and public health impacts of increasing temperatures, more volatile weather, scarcer freshwater, rising seas and poorer air quality over the next 100 years.

…Today's 21-page report, titled "Climate Change Hits Home," states that reducing greenhouse gas emissions remains crucial. But with something like 45 billion tons of carbon dioxide still spewing into the global atmosphere each year, even the worst-case forecasts for changing climate patterns look optimistic. Against that backdrop, the planning group outlined 30 different strategies for dealing with impacts on public health, transportation, ecosystems, energy, water and sea-level rise in the Bay Area.

Some of the tactics are relatively uncomplicated - like setting up fans and misters at community centers during hot spells or installing light-colored concrete in public structures rather than heat-absorbing black. But others pose tricky logistical, financial and political questions. The problems associated with sea-level rise along San Francisco Bay's 1,000 miles of shoreline are among the thorniest.

Protecting coast-side homes, businesses, critical infrastructure and natural resources will clearly warrant multibillion-dollar investments in levees, coastal armoring or elaborate retrofitting with stilts or other equipment, Metcalf said. But in certain instances, it may be more cost-effective to simply cede man-made structures to the elements. One example mentioned is Highway 37, a 21-mile thoroughfare perched at the northern edge of San Pablo Bay. If sea levels do indeed rise by the projected 55-inch maximum over the next 90 years, transit authorities might consider abandoning the route and shifting traffic to Highway 121 to the north, the paper argued….

Highway 37 at sunset, very low to the water, shot by Aztecrosales, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Caribbean islands fear climate change threat to tourism

Linda Hutchinson-Jafar in AlertNet: …Tobago, the smaller sister island of industrialised Trinidad, promotes itself as an eco-tourism destination, attracting visitors from around the world to its rainforests, wetlands, mangroves and coral reefs, which host a colourful array of birds and fish.

...Orville London, chief secretary of the Tobago House of Assembly, which administers the island, agrees that the local climate appears to be shifting, bringing larger storms. “We can no longer be considered to be outside of the hurricane belt,” he explains. “Once there was the perception that we were almost immune from hurricanes, but recent changes have indicated that this is not necessarily the case based on the kind of natural challenges we've had in recent years.”

Besides more extreme weather patterns, London notes that other impacts linked with climate change, such as coastal erosion and coral bleaching, are starting to be felt locally. Studies are being carried out to determine how best the island can prepare itself for global warming.

…The Caribbean, mainly comprised of small island nations, is the world’s most tourist-dependent region, and one of the most vulnerable to the negative impacts of climate change. Tourism accounts for around 13 percent of the Caribbean’s gross domestic product (GDP), and is an important economic driver. It brings in employment, foreign exchange earnings and foreign investment. But experts say it faces a serious threat from rising sea levels, coral bleaching, increasingly powerful tropical hurricanes and longer periods of drought.

The World Bank estimates the potential impact of climate change on all Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries at $9.9 billion a year, or around 11.3 percent of total annual GDP….

Sunset in Tobago, shot by Reinhard Jann, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Germany license

Insurance heads speak out on climate change

Senzi Dlamini in the South African Insurance Times and Investment News: The South Africa Market Watch, one of Alexander Forbes' signature insurance industry publications, recorded the views of CEOs from several leading South African insurers on climate change. Ian Kirk of Santam identified climate change as one of the greatest threats to the planet in general and to developing countries in particular since climate variation threatened the sustainability of communities the world over.

Given these challenges "the global insurance industry was well placed to use its collective expertise to assist in mitigating climate change if all role-players in the industry worked together" said Kirk. Guy Munnoch, CEO of Zurich, identified water, flooding and drought as the most immediate impact of climate change on South Africa and that the country's underinvestment in dams and reservoirs "was a threat to our ability to manage climate change successfully" said Munnoch.

As with power generation, "channels may have to be opened up for private interests to participate in the water infrastructure segment if the country's future supply was to be ensured" added Munnoch.

Nic Kohler of Hollard argued that climate change meant that the insurance industry needed to act as a collective to promote sustainable development - by investing in skills development, risk management, financial education and transformation. "The insurance industry's potential to grow our economy is vast as insurers are involved in every sector of our economy - none excluded" said Kohler.

Even though South Africa was not subject to natural disasters like those in Chile, New Zealand and Japan, Reinhard Franke, CEO of Chartis, believed that "these events should remind South African companies that their foreign assets can still suffer catastrophic exposures from natural disaster or climate change".

Certainly Chile, where Chartis and Alexander Forbes were called upon to pay a large claim, illustrated the importance of having an effective global insurance programme in place in an age of climate change…

Charles Simms, March 17, 1796, Fire Insurance Policy

More spending needed ahead of disasters: UN

The Straits Times via AFP: The earthquake and tsunami in Japan capped a series of tragic and costly global catastrophes which show that more money must be spent on risk reduction, a UN disaster official said on Tuesday.

'People actually lose lives less than they did 30 years ago because of better preparedness,' said Margareta Wahlstrom, the United Nations Special Representative for Disaster Risk Reduction. 'But the economic losses are just increasing every year because of the destruction.'

Japan's government has estimated that direct damage from last month's 9.0-magnitude earthquake and tsunami could reach around US$300 billion (S$368 billion)….

SENDAI, Japan -- U.S. Air Force search and rescue personnel witness a house adrift off the coast of Northeastern Japan March 14. The HH-60G helicopter crew surveyed the damage stricken area as part of Japan's earthquake and tsunami recovery efforts.

Climate change analysis predicts increased fatalities from heat waves

Science Blog: Global climate change is anticipated to bring more extreme weather phenomena such as heat waves that could impact human health in the coming decades. An analysis led by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health calculated that the city of Chicago could experience between 166 and 2,217 excess deaths per year attributable to heat waves using three different climate change scenarios for the final decades of the 21st century. The study was published May 1 edition of the journal Environmental Health Perspectives.

“Our study looks to quantify the impact of increased heat waves on human mortality. For major a U.S. city like Chicago, the impact will likely be profound and potentially devastating,” said Roger Peng, PhD, lead author of the study and associate professor in the Department of Biostatistics at the Bloomberg School of Public Health. “We would expect the impact to be less severe with mitigation efforts including lowering CO2 emissions.”

For the analysis, Peng and his colleagues developed three climate change scenarios for 2081 to 2100. The scenarios were based on estimates from seven global climate change models and from mortality and air pollution data for the city of Chicago from 1987 to 2005. The data were limited to the warm season from May to October of each year.

…“It’s very difficult to make predictions, but given what we know now — absent any form of adaptation or mitigation — our study shows that climate change will exacerbate the health impact of heat waves across a range of plausible future scenarios,” added Peng….

Laying asphalt on Toronto's Elm Street in 1902

Arctic will face rapid, devastating change: new reports

Jane George in Nunatsiaq Online: The Arctic Council, the international body which unites eight Arctic nations, meets next week in Nuuk. But at this May 12 gathering, top government officials from Canada, the United States, Russia, Denmark, Norway, Iceland, Sweden and Finland won’t hear how intensely climate change is affecting the Arctic today and may in the future damage the world’s food supply and flood its major cities.

Three separate reports prepared by the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program on snow and ice, mercury, and contaminants are not yet on the Arctic Council’s agenda, Nunatsiaq News has learned. Unless these reports are tabled, Canada’s foreign ministers and U.S. Sec. of State Hillary Clinton will not necessarily see or consider these rerports’ compelling new evidence about how the Arctic of tomorrow will look startlingly different than that remembered by Inuit elders.

“It’s crazy,” said Bob Corell, the chairman of the 2004 Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, who reviewed the more recent reports on climate change in the Arctic. In the future, there will be less snow, less ice and a changed environment for all living things, says 2011 AMAP report, Snow, Water, Ice and Permafrost in the Arctic, to be released May 4 in Copenhagen at a conference on climate change and pollution.

The report paints yet another bleak picture what the Arctic will be like by 2100, when temperatures will rise from 4 C to 11 C — or more. The past six years have been the warmest ever in the Arctic, the executive summary of the SWIPA report says. In the future, scientists see the Arctic Ocean continuing to absorb more of the sun’s energy during the summer due to the loss of ice — in a kind of “vicious circle,” according to one of its authors, Jim Overland.

Travelling on land will become more difficult in the Arctic, the region’s buildings and other infrastructure will suffer more stress, and some Arctic communities will face relocations….

Fiord with Eureka Weather Station; horizon: Fosheim Peninsula and Sawtooth Range on Ellesmere Island, Nunavut, Canada. Shot by the great photographer of the Arctic, Ansgar Walk, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Colonial-era erosion may have fueled wetland growth

Sid Perkins in Science Now: The salt marshes that rim the shores of Massachusetts's Plum Island estuary, which provide nesting grounds for numerous waterfowl and extremely productive spawning grounds for striped bass and soft-shell clams, have grown by 300 hectares in the last 300 years. That growth, according to a new study, was fueled by post-colonial deforestation and the erosion it caused in areas upstream. The findings suggests that efforts to maintain or restore salt marshes along the Eastern Seaboard, which have begun to disappear in recent years for a variety of reasons, may be preventing the wetlands from returning to their more natural sizes.

In the past century, wetlands in many regions have shrunk dramatically. San Francisco Bay lost about 20,000 hectares of wetlands during that period, and the Mississippi River delta lost 20 times that amount. Scientists have long presumed that the ongoing loss of wetlands in many areas of the world stems from influences such as rising sea levels and human development of coastal real estate. In many regions, dams both large and small also contribute to wetland degradation by interrupting the flow of sediment to the sea, thereby depriving the marshes of material that could accumulate and help counteract local erosion.

But in some areas, the 20th-century shrinkage of wetlands may simply be a return toward normal coverage, argue Matthew Kirwan, a geomorphologist with the U.S. Geological Survey in Charlottesville, Virginia, and colleagues. They draw that conclusion from their study of the Plum Island estuary reported in the May issue of Geology. ….

Charles Harold Davis, "Twilight over Plum Island and the Parker River," 1887

Food insecurity means few would mourn the death of Doha

Jayati Ghosh in the PovertyMatters blog, from the Guardian (UK): Officials at the WTO and leaders of several governments have launched what is said to be a "last-ditch effort" to save the Doha development round of trade negotiations from what is seen as imminent collapse. Will it collapse? And does it matter if it does? Or in other words, what is the likelihood of such a deal, and how much would it benefit developing countries? The brief answers are: low and very little.

So far, the finger-pointing for the failure has been directed either at the US (in which domestic politics suggests little appetite for external trade negotiations), or the newly significant large emerging economies such as China, Brazil and India (that are less willing to accept what are seen as unequal terms), or the overall impact of the "Great Recession" (which has made more countries wary of trade openness that could undermine domestic production and employment).

One aspect that is less talked about is the impact of the WTO Agreement on agriculture and food security in the developing world. The apathy or even downright cynicism in such quarters towards a new trade deal can be understood if we examine this. Basically, many developing countries are now more food-insecure than ever before, and at least part of that can be related to recent trade patterns.

Global food prices have been very volatile over the past four years. They rose rapidly from early 2007, reached a peak in June 2008, then declined only to increase again from early 2009. In December 2010 the FAO food price index crossed its previous peak. In March 2011 food prices were on average around 37% higher than a year earlier, while cereal prices were 60% higher. Similar patterns are evident in global fuel markets, which have been further roiled by the unrest in the Middle East….

‘Extreme climatic disaster possible in coastal Nigeria’

Adekunle Jimoh in the Nation (Nigeria): Extreme climatic and physical events of the Hurricane Katrina proportion are possible in coastal Nigeria, a geographer, Professor Akin Mabogunje has said. The Professor of Geography spoke yesterday at the opening of the second joint international conference of the University of Ilorin (UNILORIN), and University of Cape Coast, Ghana, in Ilorin, Kwara State. The conference was entitled: “Climate change and sustainable development.”

Mabogunje predicted that the surges in Lagos could have unimaginable consequences, adding: “For West Africa in particular, the significance of this exigency is the fact that our colonial masters in the past deemed it fit to locate most of our capital cities in the coastal areas.”

He said: “It could be claimed that Africa and, in particular, West Africa, has been providentially protected from all these extreme events and, therefore, need not be overly bothered about the probability of their occurrence. They should be ready to deal with the consequences of their incidence. No scientist can subscribe to such position….”

Flag map of Nigeria by Darwinek, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Asian Development Bank urges leaders to act against climate change

Monsters & Critics: Asian leaders have to act against climate change or risk pushing millions more people into poverty, a senior official from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) said Tuesday. 'If we do not fully grasp the inter-related issues of water, food and climate change and address them head-on, we may lose the hard-won gains in our fight against poverty,' Ursula Schaefer-Preuss, vice president for sustainable development, said at the ADB's annual meeting in Hanoi.

Panelists said pressures on water and food supplies had to be eased because current high food prices are already worsening poverty in Asia. In a report published last week, the bank estimated a sustained 10-per-cent rise in domestic food prices in developing Asia could push a further 64 million people into extreme poverty.

Chronic water shortages are also a pressing issue, Schaefer-Preuss said. By 2030, demand for water in Asia is anticipated to exceed supply by 40 per cent. Since nearly 80 per cent of the region's water is used in agriculture production, shortages of water can also contribute to shortages of food.

Panelists, including representatives from the Vietnamese government, the Philippines, the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and the Natural Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility in Australia, urged leaders to scale up efforts to 'climate proof' infrastructure, manage disaster risks such as floods and droughts and adopt regional security strategies….

From 1887, a lithograph of "Poor Richard illustrated, lessons for the young and old on industry, temperance, frugality &c. by Benjamin Franklin" (Print showing a small portrait of Benjamin Franklin, surrounded by 24 vignettes illustrating maxims taken from his writings.)

Desperate measures gain ground among conservationists

Deutsche Welle: While zoos are being recognized as key centers for conservation, the impact of climate change has brought some experts to the conclusion that more radical solutions are needed to save vulnerable species. From white rhinos to Californian condors and Indian tigers, recent years have seen numerous conservation success stories. Yet the overall picture remains grim.

Despite the efforts of conservationists, the world is facing record losses of species. According to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), almost one in five vertebrates is deemed threatened.

Last month a team of researchers at Germany's Max Planck institute published a paper in the journal Science calling for zoos to become the planet's future arks, arguing that their captive breeding programs will be crucial if conditions in the wild continue to deteriorate. Max Planck researcher Fernando Colchero says zoos contain amazing diversity and should be capitalizing on that, with a long-term view to re-introducing the animals into the wild at a later date.

"Zoos hold a very large percentage of species that the IUCN has labeled as endangered to some degree and therefore with proper management zoos can provide a tool for conservation," Colchero told Deutsche Welle. He and his colleagues discovered that of all the animals in the world facing some degree of threat, one in seven is already held in captivity.

Although captive breeding programs exist in many zoos, the researchers say far more needs to be done to interlink these various programs to establish safer gene pools. Yet captive breeding is far from universally accepted. Some argue that the money spent on these programs could be better put towards preserving the very habitats where threatened species are found.

Currently, zoos contribute some $350 million a year to maintaining threatened species - and that includes habitats - in the wild. It makes them the third most important source of funding for conservation worldwide…

The bat cave at the Bronx Zoo, shot by Postdlf, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

New biomass data reveals fish stocks more stable than believed

Terra Daily: Fish and marine species are among the most threatened wildlife on earth, due partly to over exploitation by fishing fleets. Yet there are differences in assessing trends in worldwide fishing stocks which, researchers writing in Conservation Biology argue, stem from inappropriate use of time trends in catches.

"Estimates of fishery status based on catches suggest that around 30% of fisheries are collapsed and 70% are overexploited or collapsed," said lead author Dr Trevor Branch from the University of Washington in Seattle. "Our assessment shows that the data are seriously biased, and that instead we should be looking at biomass data."

Biomass data from scientific stock assessments indicated a much smaller proportion in these categories (12% collapsed, 26% overexploited or collapsed), and that status trends are stable. Dr Branch's analysis suggests that in most regions fisheries management has led to stabilization, and even recovery, of fished populations.

"Species which are targeted by fishing fleets are divided into stocks, a division of species into units based on political boundaries, genetic divergence, and biological characteristics," said Branch. "The depletion of these stocks has important implications for ecosystem biodiversity; however methods of measuring depletion vary greatly."

Dr Branch's team considered stocks being "collapsed" or "overexploited" on the basis of catch and biomass data. Collapse is defined as biomass of less than 10% of unfished levels while over exploitation is defined by the governments of the United States and Australia as biomass below 50% of biomass that would produce maximum sustained catches. These reference points are widely used in fisheries management, either as management targets or as limits not to be exceeded….

Fish in net, shot by Joseolgon, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Minor cause, major effect as interactions in ecosystems can intensify climate impacts

Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences: In a new study, marine biologists from the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences (IFM-GEOMAR), together with colleagues from six other countries, show that highly complex interactions in ecosystems can intensify the impact of climate change within a relatively short period of time. The study is published in the current issue of the renowned journal "Advances in Marine Biology".

Animals and plants living in coastal areas are tough organisms. For example, the inhabitants of the shallow Baltic Sea have to cope with fluctuating temperatures, with variable salinity and even with short term pH value changes. “In a few weeks, these natural fluctuations can exceed the average shifts that are predicted for the next century due to (global) climate change, “,Professor Martin Wahl, Marine Biologist at the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences (IFM-GEOMAR) in Kiel (Germany) explains. Is global change therefore negligible for coastal ecosystems? Professor Wahl, Dr. Inken Kruse and Dr. Mark Lenz from IFM-GEOMAR, together with 14 colleagues from European and American scientific institutions, answer this question with a definite “No“. “Even the smallest variations in an ecosystem can have major consequences due to ecological intensification, says Professor Wahl”. “On the other hand, stressors can even buffer each other in certain cases”.

The authors from Germany, Finland, the Netherlands, the USA, Portugal, and Sweden explain the often surprising interactions between pressures due to abiotic stresses (e.g. warming) on the one hand and biotioc stresses (e.g. herbivores, parasites) on the other hand with the help of the stress ecology of macro algae. One of these macroalgae, the seaweed Fucus vesiculosus, commonly known as bladderwrack, inhabits the coasts of the North Sea and the Baltic Sea as well as the coast of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. “There it plays a key role in the ecosystems of shallow waters“, Martin Wahl explains. “Even though the seaweed of the Baltic Sea should be accustomed to difficult (harsh) living conditions, its populations have diminished considerably in the last decades. „Actually, Fucus vesiculosus can live in depths of up to six meters. However, we find it now only in depths of up to two meters at the Western Baltic Sea“, says Professor Wahl.

This shift cannot be explained solely by the direct effects of global change, which include eutrophication and bioinvasions. To understand this shift nevertheless, the authors of the recent study collected all available information about the bladderwrack from earlier studies, which e.g. included data on its distribution, data on light availability and nutrients, grazers, defense strategies, reactions to environmental pollution or the genetic variety of algae populations. “Thus we’ve been able to show a cascade of effects and interactions, which influence single algae or whole populations“, Wahl says.

…The results of the new study are exemplary for ecosystems in coastal areas and shelf seas in general. “Hardly any species will perish because of a single effect of climate change, but we can’t ignore it either“, Wahl says summing up the results of the new study. He hopes for a new perception of the problem “because we still know far too little about the snowball effect which ecological intensification can cause“.

An example of an interaction network of abiotic and biotic stresses on Fucus vesiculosus (based on Wahl et al., 2010; Weinberger et al., 2011, Table. 1). Shading weakens energy reserves leading to weakened antifouling (AF) andanti-grazing (AG) defences, which enhances fouling and grazing pressure. Both reduce the photosynthetic area of the thallus which amplifies the energy shortage under low light conditions. Low light and temperature-stress reduce growth, which jeopardizes the alga's ability to compensate for tissue lost to grazers, the activity of which is enhanced by temperature stress. Graphic: Martin Wahl

Transparency International urges transparency in utilising climate fund

The Daily Star (Pakistan): Transparency International (TI) on Saturday urged the government of all countries to ensure transparency in utilising the climate fund that would be used to combat global climate change effects. In a report titled ‘Global Corruption Report: Climate Change’ that was launched globally from Bangladesh the TI pointed out corruption risks in the management of the climate fund.

Huguette Labelle, Chairperson of Transparency International launched the report at a seminar titled ‘Global Climate Change: Governance and Corruption Risks and Options’ at the Brac Centre Inn at Mohakhali in the city. The report was based on analysis of research findings of more than 50 experts from 20 countries of the world.

Launching the report she said, “Climate change governance will face old corruption risks like policy capture, conflicts of interest, mismanagement of public resources or creative accounting. “However, new institutions and new funding creates new risks that require sound financial management, independent oversight bodies and access to information for the public.

“As governments prepare to spend up to 100 billion US dollars annually by 2020, we warn of the corruption risks of climate finance flowing through new untested channels and we therefore recommended strengthening governance systems to tackle them,” she said….

Photo by Eugene Pivovarov

Climate help for Lagos farming community

Michael Simire in the Daily Independent (Nigeria): A group of migrant farmers in Lagos is a beneficiary to a flagship initiative by a non-governmental organisation (NGO) aimed at building the growers’ adaptive capacity to the effects of climate change.

As a result of changes in weather conditions and rainfall pattern that are induced by the warming of the earth, agricultural activities are increasingly being boxed into a corner, leading to production declines, food prices’ rise and purchasing power decreases.

With the spate of desertification in the north, erosion in the east and coastal erosion/ocean surge in the south and coastal areas, Nigeria seems to be having her fair share of the brunt of global warming. But a lifeline may have come to the Ebonyi Farmers Association at Igbe Community in Ikorodu in Lagos who have been at the receiving end of the precarious weather situation, courtesy of the Local Initiatives for Environmental Sustainability (LIFES), which is being supported by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

Under a project that would span a yet-to-be-specified time-frame, LIFES intends to establish a community-based social network through the association, strengthen indigenous coping techniques and options to climate change and build local capacity for use of viable local adaptation techniques in the Igbe economy….

A market in Lagos, shot by Zouzou Wizman, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

Flood insurance bringing a deluge of complaints in Michigan

Todd Spangler, Peggy Walsh-Sarnecki And Kathleen Gray in the Detroit Free Press cover an issue that we'll be seeing more in the future: …Lake levels are down all over the Great Lakes region and premiums are up for the mandatory insurance for holders of federally backed mortgages in designated flood zones. But to many, flooding in southeastern Michigan is a distant memory, even as they watched fresh scenes last week of catastrophic flooding in Arkansas and Missouri.

With the Great Lakes at low levels, many Michiganders -- including U.S. Rep. Candice Miller -- are up in arms, saying they believe they're paying for billions of losses on the gulf coast and demanding an end to the National Flood Insurance Program. Don't count on it: The insurance industry won't take on the risks, and without the protection, many waterfront properties would be unmarketable.

And just because a flood hasn't happened in decades doesn't mean there is no risk. Chances of Great Lakes flooding may be slim in 2011, but that could change with a few years of heavy snow and rain in the lakes' vast drainage basin.

"This is cyclical. It will change," said Larry Larson, executive director of the Association of State Floodplain Managers. "Therein is the problem: People think 15 years is a long time."
Low lake levels and higher premiums have many Michiganders steamed about flood insurance…

…And although angry Michiganders may be misguided on some points, such as believing their premiums are paying for coastal flooding from hurricanes, including Katrina and the rest from the destructive 2005 season, they have legitimate gripes. One fair allegation is that some homes with less risk are lumped with those that have more….

Frozen Lake St. Clair in Michigan, shot by MJCdetroit, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Venice turns to floating barriers to ward off flood threats

Terra Daily via AFP: Flood-prone Venice has launched an ambitious plan to build mobile barriers at the mouth of its lagoon and protect the city from rising sea levels. About 3,000 people are involved in the "Moses" project, which costs 5.4 billion euros ($7.9 billion), and is scheduled for completion in 2014.

"Once finished, the system will protect Venice from high water levels of up to three metres," said architect Flavia Faccioli from the Venezia Nuova consortium, grouping some 50 companies involved in the project. "We're on schedule so far. We have already carried out three billion euros worth of works and will be carrying out the first test next July," Faccioli told AFP.

The 78 giant box-shaped barriers will be divided into four sections at the head of the three inlets that link the lagoon with the Adriatic Sea. They will be inserted into immense tanks on the sea floor. Should high waters threaten the city, pressured air will be pumped into the barriers, raising them up on hinges to block the tidal flow.

Once the danger has passed, the air will be expelled and the barriers would fill with water and sink back to the sea floor. "We are building 11 crates at the same time," Enrico Pellegrini, the head engineer at one of the building sites, told reporters as they inspected the ongoing works at the Malamocco inlet….

Saint Moses church in Venice, Italy; facade. Cenotaph for Vincenzo Fini († 1726), by Heinrich Meyring. Picture by Giovanni Dall'Orto, August 12 2007

New report says climate change likely to make water more scarce in California

Mike Sprague in the Pasadena Star-News: Gov. Jerry Brown declared the state's drought over, but in the long term the availability of water locally is still going to pose a problem, according to a new government report. A report released last week by the Interior Department said annual flows in three river basins - the Colorado, Rio Grande and San Joaquin - could decline by as much 8 percent to 14 percent over the next four decades.

The Colorado and San Joaquin rivers supply water to Southern California. "The study basically verifies previous work that has been done by climate scientists," said Timothy Brick, who represents Pasadena on the board of the Metropolitan Water District.

"These are big warning flags to Southern California," Brick said. "We need to stop talking about drought and start talking about a new era of wise water use that takes into account climate change and other realities - the still-increasing population in Southern California and environmental challenges for our imported water supplies."

The report doesn't contradict Brown's elimination of the drought declaration in California, Brick said. "This year rain has been generous," he said. "(But) people recognize that one year doesn't end a drought."…

Coyote Dry Lake in the Mojave Desert, California, shot by Jeff T. Alu, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Coop sector urged to join crusade for climate-resilient Philippines

Philippine Information Agency: With the advent of climate change and disaster risks, many sectors in the country today are slowly adopting ‘green’ projects to make a climate and disaster-resilient nation. During the 1st NCR Cooperative Sector Conference on climate change, Senator Loren Legarda, chair of the senate committee on climate change urged the cooperative sector to focus on ‘green’ technologies and enterprises.

Cooperativism must be translated into a nationwide crusade that make use of recycles and natural materials that promote the creation of products and designs that various cooperative communities and livelihood groups can advocate and develop.

Legarda encouraged cooperatives to advocate green living, fair trade, and care for the environment. One of the principles of cooperativism — the concern for community — is geared towards the achievement of sustainable development, which is essential in climate change adaptation, she added.

The cooperatives sector according to Legarda has the capacity to improve current activities that promote sustainable development and unite and mobilize collective efforts in confronting climate change challenges….

Escolta, the principal business Street in Manila, Philippine Islands. Around 1899