Social And Economic Impacts Of Climate Change

Social And Economic Impacts Of Climate Change – Climate change and poverty are part of a vicious cycle. The inability of vulnerable sections to effectively mitigate the effects of climate change will worsen their situation

Given India’s high level of industrialization in South Asia, it has a major role to play in climate change. In the 1970s and 80s, although we had little knowledge of how climate change would affect India, it was clear that unequal development patterns between developed and developing countries and greed were the biggest polluters – India’s then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi eloquently said. .

Social And Economic Impacts Of Climate Change

Over the years, India’s position in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has reflected its vested interests: Developing countries should not be bound by emission reduction requirements unless they are provided with the necessary financial and technological assistance to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. and such regulations to limit greenhouse gases do not arise at the expense of their development trajectories.

Climate Change And Health Care

Gradually, the country’s robust economic growth has put India in a leadership role, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi announcing the creation of the International Solar Alliance (ISA) at the COP-21 Summit. Such proactive actions, if implemented both nationally and globally, will help to bend the growth curve of global warming. With its current 121 member countries located in the Sun Belt, ISA’s overall goal is to work tirelessly to make solar energy affordable and accessible to all – between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. This calls for expanding solar power projects to meet growing energy demand and combat climate change.

The World Bank has released a report, Turn Down the Heat, on the potential impacts of rising temperatures on agricultural production, water resources, coastal ecosystems and cities. The report envisages future scenarios for a world of 2 degrees Celsius and 4 degrees Celsius.

According to their findings for India, extreme heat events are occurring more frequently and covering larger areas than previously. West and South India may shift to higher climate regimes, with cities exposed to the “urban heat island” effect. Global climate risk indices have shown India as the country worst affected by heatwaves over the past few years.

Second, dry years tend to be drier and wet years tend to be wetter, making the summer monsoon very unpredictable. This leads to huge losses in agricultural production. Environmental extremes and meteorological events such as tropical storms, cyclones, tornadoes, river floods, landslides, wildfires and droughts are common. The estimated cost of damage from the recent cyclones Tauktae (west coast) and Yaas (east coast) is $5 billion, including the loss of infrastructure, power lines, agricultural land, homes and precious human lives. In previous years, there were other devastating cyclones like Amphan, Titli and Gija. Years of drought led to a massive decline in agricultural production. It is assumed that by 2040, agricultural production will begin to decrease.

Pdf) Climate Change In Norway: Analysis Of Economic And Social Impacts And Adaptations

Third, the glaciers in the Himalayan ranges began to recede. Changes in the ice caps affect the population of the lower reaches of the Indus, Ganges and Brahmaputra plains.

These direct consequences of meteorological and hydrological changes caused by global warming affect the society and economic growth of India. Climate change and poverty are part of a vicious cycle, as each entity amplifies the effects of the other. Climate change threatens to disrupt natural resource systems, thereby adversely affecting the populations (farmers, fishermen and Adivasi communities) who depend on these ecosystems. The inability of vulnerable sites to effectively mitigate the effects of climate change will worsen their situation.

Its main impact is on agricultural production and food security. In India, the yield of the wheat crop has already peaked. Increasing water scarcity, seawater intrusion and rising temperatures threaten crop yields, threaten food security and make India dependent on food imports. Loss of vegetation and the proliferation of pests and insects are common. It would not be an extrapolation to link farmer suicides to climate change.

Also, malnutrition and increased child growth. Rising temperatures increase vector-borne diseases such as malaria and diarrheal infections – the main causes of child mortality – reduced worker productivity, increased cardiovascular disease and death.

Climate Change, Central Banks And Financial Risk

Changing precipitation patterns and melting glaciers will affect water security. Irrigation facilities for crop production, increasing demand due to population growth leads to water shortage. Cities like Chennai witnessed this type of insecurity when it was hit by severe floods in 2015 and a year later the city suffered from acute water shortage. Also, the lack of water affects sanitary and hygienic facilities – this is an important prerequisite for the health of the country.

Hydroelectric power plants can produce erratic power generation due to reduced river flow. India’s freshwater thermal plants may also face power generation problems.

Water sharing is already a contentious issue in South Asian politics. Water scarcity can further increase the pressure. Reduced agricultural productivity and reduced farm incomes can lead to heavy rural-to-urban or even cross-border migration. Such large-scale migration of people, so-called climate refugees, can cause conflicts.

With the loss of forests and ecosystems such as mangroves and coral reefs, the supply of several ecosystem products is reduced. These include medicinal plants and herbs. Ecosystem services provided by forests and mangroves, such as climate regulation, water filtration and clean air, may decline due to climate change caused by global warming.

Primer To Climate Scenarios

Population vulnerability in India and South Asian countries is linked to low resilience, which is further exacerbated by low per capita income, social inequality and poverty. According to a study by the International Labor Organization (ILO), South Asia is expected to lose five percent of working hours due to heat by 2030, which is 43 million full-time jobs.

Non-economic losses refer to losses that are not often traded in markets but are highly relevant to the victims. These include loss of life and rising sea levels leading to loss of biodiversity and cultural heritage. Thus, there is a need to integrate these non-economic costs into decision-making processes to reduce upfront costs. For this, historical analogies, memory and recognition, and oral history provide valuable insights for the UNFCCC science-policy interface.

The way forward is to first achieve clean energy without fossil fuels to meet the basic energy needs of rural India such as cooking, heating and lighting. Second, eliminate agricultural waste burning and instead use crop residues to produce renewable biomass fuels for energy and compost feedstock for healthy soils. Third, abandoning diesel fuel by 2030 will be effective in reducing carbon dioxide emissions.

Fourth, the natural ability of soil to absorb atmospheric carbon dioxide from the air needs to be accelerated through good land management. This not only removes carbon dioxide from the air, but also improves the quality of the soil and increases the yield of crops such as rice and wheat. Five, a large-scale climate education program designed to educate high school and college students and develop local knowledge about climate change. Sixth, a gender audit is needed for micro and macro planning and program implementation, which provides a platform for women farmers, community workers, students, and environmental youth. There is an equal need to strengthen the climate and gender equality agenda by encouraging the participation of Adivasi and Dalit women and feminist experts on climate change.

Global Warming Has Increased Global Economic Inequality

(The writer is Simi Mehta, Director General and Editorial Director of the Impact and Policy Research Institute (IMPRI), and Ria Mohal is a Research Fellow at the Institute. Views expressed are personal. Millions of poor people face challenges as the climate changes. emergencies, health impacts, food food, water and livelihood security, migration and forced displacement, loss of cultural identity and other related risks.

Climate change is closely linked to global patterns of inequality. The poorest and most vulnerable bear the brunt of climate change but contribute the least to the crisis. As the effects of climate change intensify, millions of vulnerable people face disproportionate challenges in terms of extreme events, health impacts, food, water and livelihood security, migration and forced displacement, loss of cultural identity and other related risks.

Some social groups are particularly vulnerable to crises, such as female-headed households, children, the disabled, indigenous peoples and ethnic minorities, landless tenants, migrant workers, displaced persons, sexual and gender minorities, the elderly and other socially marginalized people. groups. The main reasons for their vulnerability lie in the combination of their geographical location; their financial, socio-economic, cultural and gender status; and their access to resources, services, decision-making power and justice.

Poor and marginalized groups are demanding ambitious action on climate change. Climate change is more than an environmental crisis – it is a social crisis and forces us to address inequalities at many levels: between rich and poor countries; between the rich and the poor in countries; between men and women, between generations. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has emphasized the need for climate solutions that are consistent with the principles of procedural and distributive justice for more effective development outcomes.

Economic Development In An Era Of Climate Change

The most vulnerable are often disproportionately affected by measures to combat climate change. if not