Climate change must be addressed by all sectors

A senior science adviser from the Caribbean has called on all sectors, from agriculture to tourism, to incorporate concerns about climate change within their work and future development.

Dr Ulric Trotz, from the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre, said that more organisations need to acknowledge the potential impacts of global warming on their respective industries.

"It is crucial to make the connection between what is happening in our environment and how it impacts across society," he said.

One example given my Dr Trotz about this "connection" is the destruction of 100,000 hectares of rainforest, which he argued may prompt unseasonably heavy rainfall, which could in turn lead to the loss of top soil. "We are sitting on a time bomb," he warned.

These remarks were made at a meeting on 'climate change and its implications for the Caribbean region,' organised by the Commonwealth Secretariat and the Caribbean Broadcasting Union. The three-day event, which began on 25 February 2008, was designed to expand journalists' knowledge of climate change. The 15 journalists who attended represent media houses from across the Caribbean.

"The Caribbean is highly vulnerable. Our position now is to build our ability to adapt to climate change. The media is a critical partner in this road ahead," Dr Trotz observed.

He marked out sea level rise as one significant worry for small islands, as it impinges on a number of sectors, including infrastructure, human settlement, agriculture and tourism. The one degree rise in sea temperature off the coast of Barbados, he told reporters, has led yellow tuna to migrate to cooler waters, which is damaging the country's fishing industry.

Lovelette Brooks, a news editor in Jamaica who was present at the conference, said that because people are now seeing the results of global warming - like yellow tuna migrating - their attention has been caught.

"People are more aware of climate change because they are seeing it. We [the media] now have an audience that is ready," she said.

Dr Trotz also impressed upon the journalists present that the earlier effective action is taken, the less costly it will be in the long run. This was one of the conclusions from the Stern Review, which came out in October 2006 and examined the effect of climate change on the world economy.

This assessment was also recognised by the Commonwealth Consultative Group on the Environment at a meeting in Monaco last week. The Group, which is the Commonwealth's primary intergovernmental forum for consultations on environment and sustainable development issues, acknowledged that "the cost of inaction on mitigation and adaptation is far greater than the cost of early action."

Following the presentation from Dt Trotz, journalists were invited to ask questions on specific areas of interest they picked up on during the talk. The event - which was funded by the Commonwealth Media Development Fund - was chaired by John Vidal, Environment Editor for the Guardian newspaper.

Key Links:

• Sustainablility
• Commonwealth Week Theme 2008: The Environment – our future