Climate change can be beat, but we need to act. Climate change causes hunger. Illegal clearing of tropical forests for beef soy and other crops is a major source of climate change. Seeing the connections and acting to stop them is the only way that we are going to ensure a liveable future!.
The UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) has warned that food aid for 1.4 million people in Chad faces a “looming halt” because there is no money, even as the country is experiencing an influx of refugees from the fighting in Sudan’s Darfur region.
On the other side of the continent, climate change has upended lives and livelihoods across the Horn of Africa in the last two years. The United Nations has said 4.3 million people, a quarter of Somalia’s population, are at risk of “crisis-level hunger or worse” this year due to drought and floods. According to Somalia’s disaster management agency SoDMA, the torrential rains have affected nearly 1.5 million people in South-Central and caused the death of at least 50 people. Its data shows that 687,235 people in the Gedo, Hiraan, Bay and Bakool regions were forced to flee their houses, as floodwaters swept away key bridges and destroyed up to 6,000 houses.
Funding shortfalls and increasing humanitarian needs mean World Food Programme (WFP) will have to pause food for millions of displaced people and refugees in Nigeria, Central African Republic and Cameroon beginning in December. These are people who have experienced war, compounded by climate change propelled natural disasters. Children are the hardest hit and are experiencing life changing food insecurity which could lead to starvation.
It’s time for people in Western coun tries to dig deep and help their fellow citizens of planet Earth who are suffering from the impacts of a change to the climate that they did little to cause. @WFP @SavetheChildren @IRC @Oxfam #WFP #SavetheChildren #IRC #Oxfam
Starvation Looming in Africa and the World’s Attention is Elsewhere!
People wait for water with containers at a camp, one of the 500 camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs) in town, in Baidoa, Somalia, on February 13, 2022. Insufficient rainfall since late 2020 has come as a fatal blow to populations already suffering from a locust invasion between 2019 and 2021, the Covid-19 pandemic. For several weeks, humanitarian organizations have multiplied alerts on the situation in the Horn of Africa, which raises fears of a tragedy similar to that of 2011, the last famine that killed 260,000 people in Somalia. – Desperate, hungry and thirsty, more and more people are flocking to Baidoa from rural areas of southern Somalia, one of the regions hardest hit by the drought that is engulfing the Horn of Africa. (Photo by YASUYOSHI CHIBA / AFP) (Photo by YASUYOSHI CHIBA/AFP via Getty Images)
Over 3 million people in East Africa (Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia) are facing starvation but the world isn’t watching and they can’t even get in the newspaper.
Climate change is a major cause of this crisis. After four consecutive failed rains, hunger in the region is worsening week by week. People have already started dying from starvation and the window to prevent mass deaths is rapidly closing.
A joint report from Oxfam and Save the Children in May found that one person is dying of hunger every 48 seconds in drought-ravaged Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia. The war in Ukraine has made food “unattainable for millions” of people in East Africa due to the increase in cost and scarcity of food.
The U.N. calls for donations to avert this catastrophe have fallen way short as donor countries grapple with their own increases in hunger and aid to the refugees fleeing the war in Ukraine hold donors’ interest and get their limited foreign aid funds.
People wait for food distributions and health services at a camp for internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Baidoa, Somalia, on February 14, 2022. Insufficient rainfall since late 2020 has come as a fatal blow to populations already suffering from a locust invasion between 2019 and 2021, the Covid-19 pandemic. For several weeks, humanitarian organizations have multiplied alerts on the situation in the Horn of Africa, which raises fears of a tragedy similar to that of 2011, the last famine that killed 260,000 people in Somalia. – Desperate, hungry and thirsty, more and more people are flocking to Baidoa from rural areas of southern Somalia, one of the regions hardest hit by the drought that is engulfing the Horn of Africa. (Photo by YASUYOSHI CHIBA / AFP) (Photo by YASUYOSHI CHIBA/AFP via Getty Images)
FAO and World Food Programme warn of looming widespread food crisis as hunger threatens stability in dozens of countries.
Climate change, conflict, weather extremes, economic shocks, the lingering impacts of COVID-19, and the ripple effects from the war in Ukraine push hundreds of millions of people in countries across the world into poverty and hunger – as food and fuel price spikes drive nations closer to instability.
We’re facing a perfect storm that is not just going to hurt the poorest of the poor – it’s also going to overwhelm hundreds of millions of families who until now have just about kept their heads above water.
Conditions now are much worse than during the Arab Spring in 2011 and 2007-2008 food price crisis, when 48 countries were rocked by political unrest, riots and protests. We’ve already seen what’s happening in Indonesia, Pakistan, Peru, and Sri Lanka – that’s just the tip of the iceberg. We have solutions. But we need to act, and act fast.
First, we must act to save those who are facing starvation. These disasters can still be averted, but people are already dying, children are already experiencing stunting which will have life-long effects. Once the immediate starvation is addressed the world must immediately focus on hunger in the world as many, many countries are experiencing instability due to high food costs and shortages and that is everyone’s problem to solve.
Millions will die unless they get immediate help. Support the international humanitarian organizations that are desperately trying to help: @Oxfam, @RESCUEorg, @WFP, @SavetheChildren, @UNICEF
The latest Climate Report from the IPCC, confirms that climate change is and will increasingly cause food supply shocks. Harvests are predicted to fail simultaneously in multiple major food-producing countries. Such shocks will lead to shortages and price spikes. Climate change is a “threat multiplier,” making hunger emergencies worse. In some cases, it will be the primary cause. Food productivity is already down 21%.
Climate change does not act in isolation, it compounds food shortages from the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, and makes risks increasingly complex and difficult to manage. Climate change is affecting agricultural productivity in many different ways. Climate change causes increases in mean and extreme temperatures, alters rain and snow amounts, changes the intensity and timing monsoons and storms .
Elevated CO2 concentrations cause uneven increases in temperatures worldwide. Fluctuating wind and jet stream patterns can bring arctic air south and tropical moist air into the arctic.
It is predicted that the world’s population will hit 10 billion people in 2050. It is also predicted that by 2050, we will have hotter temperatures, increased flooding, disruptions in rainy seasons, sea level rise, reduced access to freshwater, all of which will make feeding them more challenging.
The IPCC report demonstrates that if we surpass 1.5°C of warming in the next two decades, even temporarily will result in irreversible impacts to crop, animal and seafood production. Every inhabited region of the world will experience the effects of climate change on food.
Over 40 percent of the global population, already lives in places that are going to be devastated by climate impacts. Despite contributing the least to the problem, they face with the worst impacts and have little or no adaptation funding.
Insufficient rainfall since late 2020 has come as a fatal blow to populations already suffering from a locust invasion between 2019 and 2021, the Covid-19 pandemic. A drought is engulfing the Horn of Africa. (Photo by YASUYOSHI CHIBA / AFP) (Photo by YASUYOSHI CHIBA/AFP via Getty Images)
We laugh at the thought of lemmings running off cliffs into the sea. But humanity has all of the knowledge we need to know that we need to act immediately to build resiliency into our food production and distribution. And rather than taking action, the majority of people are continuing like zombies toward the cliff. We need to mobilize the resources necessary to prepare to the crisis we know is just around the corner.
We have to anticipate crop failures and encourage more production on moderate and low yield areas, so if, using an example from this year, floods reduce the wheat harvest in China at the same time that Russia and Ukraine go to war and potentially reduce global wheat supplies by 30%, there are alternate sources of food. We can do it. We need to stop being polite and demand action. Millions of people are at peril if these preparations are not made.
Antarctic areas reach 40 degrees Celsius or 72 degrees Fahrenheit above normal at same time as north pole regions hit 30 degrees Celsius or 54 degrees Fahrenheit above usual levels!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
At this time of year, the Antarctic should be rapidly cooling after its summer, and the Arctic only slowly emerging from its winter, as days lengthen. For both poles to show such heating at once is unprecedented.
The danger is twofold: heatwaves at the poles are a strong signal of the damage humanity is wreaking on the climate; and the melting could also trigger further cascading changes that will accelerate climate breakdown.
As polar sea ice melts, particularly in the Arctic, it reveals dark sea that absorbs more heat than reflective ice, warming the planet further. Much of the Antarctic ice covers land, and its melting raises sea levels.
Scientists warned that the events unfolding were “historic”, “unprecedented” and “dramatic”. When are politicians going to hear their calls???
The iceberg, called A-76, measures about 105 miles in length and is over 15 miles wide. It broke from the western side of Ronne Ice Shelf in Antarctica’s Weddell Sea, the European Space Agency said. The iceberg is slightly larger than the Spanish island of Majorca and four times the size of New York City
The iceberg, called A-76, measures about 105 miles in length and is over 15 miles wide. It broke from the western side of Ronne Ice Shelf in Antarctica’s Weddell Sea, the European Space Agency said. The iceberg is slightly larger than the Spanish island of Majorca and four times the size of New York City
1977, at McGill University in Montreal, I learned about the appearance of “global warming” which was being revealed as the world reduced sulfur dioxide emissions that were causing the acidification of lakes around the world. Since then, the reports have grown more and more dire.
At first scientists were subdued pointing out the problem politely, thinking that people would react to the science as they had with the ozone depleting substances and sulfur dioxide. They had not expected the backlash, false narrative and politicization of the issue that Big Oil unleashed.
Now they are shouting their warnings and still not enough people are alarmed. What can we do to magnify the voices for action to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases?
The IPCC has plotted the disaster that is going to occur if we don’t durtail us of greenhouse gases. It also plots a path to a sustainable future. We have to follow that path!
Would love to hear ideas. Perhaps with a little help from you, we can make the changes happen!
Climate change does not act in isolation, it compounds food shortages from the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, and makes risks increasingly complex and difficult to manage. Climate change is affecting agricultural productivity in many different ways. Climate change causes increases in mean and extreme temperatures, alters rain and snow amounts, changes the intensity and timing monsoons and storms .
