Environment Forum
Global environmental challenges
Cancun talks ignore intrusive aspect of climate change
One pesky aspect of climate change is that rising temperatures and stronger storms may increase invasions of non-native species to places that have no natural defenses against them.
The issue is mostly being ignored at the annual U.N. climate talks in Cancun, Mexico, California’s Agriculture Secretary A.G. Kawamura said.
Just a few miles away from the talks an island called Isla Mujeres has been fighting an infestation of cactus moth swept there during a hurricane, storms that are expected to get stronger as a result of climate change. The moth destroys prickly pears, and if it makes it to mainland –ferries full of tourists go to and fro Cancun to the island all day long — it would could harm more than the price of prickly pear fruit for your margarita.
Mexico is afraid it could reach the Chihuahuan and Sonoran deserts and hurt the 76 types of pricklies there and the 38 found only in Mexico. Many insects eat only the cacti and in turn many desert birds and mammals depend on those insects.
Pricklies are also an important food source in Mexico — you might have had them in a nopales soup or salad.
Another example is biting midges swept up in dust storms from North Africa that infect European sheep and cattle with blue tongue disease, a big headache for countries trying to sell livestock to other countries.
Another is the pine beetle creeping farther North in North America and killing vast swaths of tree stands as average winters are too mild to kill it off.
The World Bank’s $6 billion man on climate change
As the special envoy on climate change for the World Bank, Andrew Steer might be thought of as the $6 billion man of environmental finance. He oversees more than that amount for projects to fight the effects of global warming.
“More funds flow through us to help adaptation and mitigation than anyone else,” Steer said in a conversation at the bank’s Washington headquarters. Named to the newly created position in June, Steer said one of his priorities is to marshall more than $6 billion in the organization’s Climate Investment Funds to move from smaller pilot projects to large-scale efforts.
While the World Bank is not a party to global climate talks set for Cancun, Mexico, later this year, it is deeply engaged in this issue, Steer said. Acknowledging that an international agreement on climate change is a long shot this year, he said there are still opportunities to make changes to cut the greenhouse gas emissions that spur climate change.
“We do see there are opportunities,” Steer said. “The mistake would be if it’s sort of all or nothing.” The bank is strongly supporting action to limit deforestation, offer quick financing to start climate projects and reform carbon markets to extend them to countries that have been left out so far.
Even though the World Bank won’t be at the negotiating table in Cancun, its members will be there, and 80 percent of them want the bank to focus on climate change, Steer said. It’s all part of a what he sees as a fundamental shift in the international attitude toward dealing with this problem.
“There is a new revolution that’s going on now,” he said . “It’s not only driven by personal commitment, like it would have been 15 years ago … Now it’s driven by just the sheer logic … If you care about long-term poverty reduction, you simply cannot avoid this issue.”
Photo credits: REUTERS/Supri Supri (Andrew Steer (right) then the World Bank’s Indonesia country director, with World Health Organization’s Georg Peterson at a news conference in Jakarta, August 24, 2006)
