Climate Change : Are our leaders taking the problem seriously?

The world, or at least, Western populaces and their leaders have at last accepted climate change as a real, grave and imminent threat to our security and quality of life. But the response to tackling the crisis has taken a bizarre twist.

Global plans and accords have thus far been constructed largely, and justly, around compromise – taking into account each nation’s needs and concerns. However most if not all have been constructed around timing and phasing in strategies that have at their core, an interest in protecting our economies. This is a valid interest that must be maintained in agreements of the future, but it must also be balanced by the consequences of waiting or phasing in over too long a period of time.

When Prime Minister Stephen Harper presents his plan for Canada to tackle Global Warming, there is plenty of talk about how this plan has been built around what the economy can stomach, and how we will phase in initiatives so as to minimize negative consequences on GDP, but there is a notable absence of talk of what the environment can stomach if the same plan is enacted. The question what will the planet (and its ecosystem) look like in 20 years if we have reduced emissions by only 40%? is paramount to assessing if a plans targets and objectives are aggressive enough.

First, because as Al Gore and others have eloquently pointed out “all the gold in the world is worthless if we do not have a planet to live on”. Secondly, because it is extremely important to understand that environmental recovery does not happen overnight, nature needs time to recuperate. For example if our economies and societies were to be carbon neutral by 2100, global warming would continue until nature had enough time to filter out extra carbon and reset the natural and rightful balance. Therefore strategies and plans that legitimately tackle global warming should include adequate and researched recovery stages. Our priority and primary objective, if we are taken this issues seriously, must be: what must be done to halt global warming? and not, what can we afford to do?

To proceed with our current mantra is similar to saying, in 1939, that we recognize the threat posed by Nazi Germany and have designed a plan to respond to the threat based not on what we project will win the war but on what we project will ensure our economies continued prosperity while we fight.

Our societies and economies must begin to view the climate change crisis with the same importance as any other threat, conflict or war. Climate Change is a crisis that must be overcome, not by violence or death but through our common sacrifice and innovation.

As citizens of this planet, we must demand that our politicians and institutions, who agree with the dangers of climate change, put forward plans that take into account both the consequences of delay and the importance of allowing our eco-system time to recuperate. We need plans that will at any cost solve (not stall) the crisis.