Tag Archives: drought

Civil War Risks Triggering ‘Epic, Biblical-Style Famine’ in Sudan

Leave a reply

“Millions of lives and the peace and stability of an entire region are at stake,” warned the head of the World Food Program.

By Brett Wilkins. Published 3-6-2024 by Common Dreams

South Sudanese children at the Imvepi Refugee camp in Northern Uganda. Photo: UNMISS/flickr/CC

International humanitarian organizations warned Wednesday that Sudan’s civil war risks triggering severe famine unless the fighting stops.

Fighting between rival factions of Sudan’s military government broke out nearly 11 months ago and spread rapidly throughout the northeastern African nation of 46 million people. Around 15,000 people have been killed and nearly 6 million others displaced during the war, while an estimated 1.5 million Sudanese have fled the country as refugees.

Continue reading →
Share Button

Ticker Shows Climate Inaction Cost US Nearly $3,000 Per Second in 2023

Leave a reply

“This exorbitant price tag, driven by an unparalleled number of weather and climate disasters, reinforces the urgent need for the Biden administration to use every tool at their disposal,” said one campaigner.

By Jessica Corbett. Published 2-23-2024 by Common Dreams

Road sign on U.S. Route 101 in Windsor warning of severe weather during the atmospheric rivers in January 2023. Photo: Sarah Stierch (CC BY 4.0)

After an unprecedented number of billion-dollar extreme weather disasters across the United States last year, advocacy groups on Friday released an updated “Cost of Inaction Ticker” estimating the price of not tackling the fossil fuel-driven climate emergency.

Launched by the Climate Action Campaign and other groups in 2022, the ticker is based on data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which found that 2023 was the hottest year on record and the 28 disasters that caused at least $1 billion in damage collectively cost Americans at least $92.9 billion, or $2,945.84 per second.

Continue reading →
Share Button

Record 50 Million Children Now Displaced as Wars, Climate Crisis Rage

Leave a reply

“When children lose their homes, they lose almost everything: their access to healthcare, education, food, and safety,” one advocate said.

By Olivia Rosane. Published 2-20-2024 by Common Dreams

Children in the area of Shangil Tobaya, Sudan. Photo: United Nations Photo/flickr/CC

The 10 biggest global crises—including Israel’s war on Gaza—forced more than 10 million children to flee their homes in 2023.

That figure likely puts the total number of displaced children at more than 50 million, a new record, Save the Children said in an analysis published Tuesday. The number of children displaced worldwide has also more than doubled from around 20.6 million in 2010. While the number of displaced people overall reached a record 114 million in October 2023, children are being pushed from their homes at an even faster rate than adults and face unique vulnerabilities.

Continue reading →
Share Button

‘Baby Steps’ Will Not Avert Climate Catastrophe, UN Warns

Leave a reply

The United Nations assessment coincided with the release of “the world’s most comprehensive roadmap of how to close the global gap in climate action across sectors.”

By Jessica Corbett. Published 11-14-2023 by Common Dreams

A resident holds a sign asking passing drivers to slow down to reduce wakes that exacerbate flooding in a suburb of Houston, Texas, in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey in 2017. (U.S. Customs and Border Protection photo by Glenn Fawcett)

“The world is failing to get a grip on the climate crisis.”

That’s how United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres began his Tuesday remarks about a new U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) report on nationally determined contributions (NDCs), or countries’ plans to meet the goals of the Paris agreement, including its 1.5°C temperature target.

The UNFCCC analysis “provides yet more evidence that the world remains massively off track to limiting global warming to 1.5°C and avoiding the worst of climate catastrophe,” said Guterres. “As the report shows, global ambition stagnated over the past year and national climate plans are strikingly misaligned with the science.”

Continue reading →
Share Button

Panama Canal drought: Rolling ecological crisis is raising prices everywhere

Leave a reply

Climate change and El Niño are causing global shortages of everything from Barbie dolls to natural gas

By James Meadway. Published 9-21-2023 by openDemocracy

The Agua Clara (Clear Water) Locks at the Atlantic (Caribbean Sea) end of the canal. Photo: Dan Lundberg/flickr/CC

It’s been another summer of extreme weather and the relentless drumbeat of climate change syncopating with the warm-water Pacific Ocean cycle of El Niño has reverberated across the globe.

Floods in the Balkans and North Africa have killed thousands, wildfires have raged across much of the Mediterranean, India’s rice crop has been hit by drought and Canada’s wheat harvests by floods. Meanwhile, in Central America, the driest weather in decades is menacing one of the most important transport arteries on earth.

Continue reading →
Share Button

Carbon markets that benefit the West will not solve Africa’s climate crisis

Leave a reply

Western interests dominated the Africa Climate Summit. Time for African nations to put themselves first

-By Claire Nasike and Peter Osogo Published 9-15-2023 by openDemocracy

The First Africa Climate Summit was held at the Kenyatta International Convention Center in Nairobi, Kenya on September 6 2023. Photo: Paul Kagame/flickr/CC

The Africa Climate Summit 2023 in Kenya last week united African leaders for a discussion on the climate crisis, with a specific focus on Africa and its policy stance ahead of COP28 in Dubai.

One would have expected African leaders to propose sovereign solutions to the challenges faced by their countries. These include recurrent hunger, flooding, drought, resource exploitation, water and soil pollution, and control of food systems by Western corporations.

Continue reading →
Share Button

‘What the Climate Emergency Looks Like’: Extreme Heat Busts Records Across Asia

Leave a reply

Sweltering temperatures have devastated numerous Asian countries this month, eliciting demands for lifesaving climate action.

By Kenny Stancil. Published 4-19-2023 by Common Dreams

The European model shows temperatures across Southeast Asia rising well above normal Monday. Image: WeatherBell.com

Hundreds of millions of people throughout Asia are suffering Wednesday as a deadly heatwave turbocharged by the fossil fuel-driven climate crisis continues to pummel large swaths of the continent, with little relief in sight—reigniting calls for immediate action to slash greenhouse gas pollution.

Record-high temperatures have been observed in several Asian countries this month, including at 109 weather stations across 12 Chinese provinces on Monday. Scorching heat in India, meanwhile, has killed more than a dozen people and forced school closures this week.

Continue reading →
Share Button

Researchers Warn Great Salt Lake’s Retreat Threatens Crucial Ecosystem, Public Health

Leave a reply

“The lake’s ecosystem is not only on the edge of collapse. It is collapsing,” said one ecologist.

By Julia Conley.  Published 1-7-2023 by Common Dreams

Scientists are warning Utah officials that the Great Salt Lake is shrinking far faster than experts previously believed, and calling for a major reduction in water consumption across the American West in order to prevent the lake from disappearing in the next five years.

Researchers at Brigham Young University (BYU) led more than 30 scientists from 11 universities and advocacy groups in a report released this week showing that the lake is currently at 37% of its former volume, with its rapid retreat driven by the historic drought that’s continuing across the West. Continue reading →

Share Button

Nobody loved you, 2022

Leave a reply

From devastating floods in Pakistan to Italy’s far-right PM to overturning Roe v Wade, this was a year of extremes

By Adam Ramsay  Published 12-30-2022 by openDemocracy

A flooded village in Matiari, in the Sindh province of Pakistan. Photo: Asad Zaidi/UNICEF

How do you turn 365 days experienced by eight billion people – and billions more other beings – into some kind of story?

Maybe you start with some events?

In which case, 2022 was the year that Covid vaccines kicked in. Daily global deaths hit 77,000 on 7 February, and have declined fairly steadily ever since. It was the year Russia invaded Ukraine, the first war between major European powers since 1945. Continue reading →

Share Button

After COP27, all signs point to world blowing past the 1.5 degrees global warming limit – here’s what we can still do about it

Leave a reply

 

Young activists have been pushing to keep a 1.5-Celsius limit, knowing their future is at stake.
AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty

 

Peter Schlosser, Arizona State University

The world could still, theoretically, meet its goal of keeping global warming under 1.5 degrees Celsius, a level many scientists consider a dangerous threshold. Realistically, that’s unlikely to happen.

Part of the problem was evident at COP27, the United Nations climate conference in Egypt.

While nations’ climate negotiators were successfully fighting to “keep 1.5 alive” as the global goal in the official agreement, reached Nov. 20, 2022, some of their countries were negotiating new fossil fuel deals, driven in part by the global energy crisis. Any expansion of fossil fuels – the primary driver of climate change – makes keeping warming under 1.5 C (2.7 Fahrenheit) compared to pre-industrial times much harder. Continue reading →

Share Button