This is a brief presentation about climate change, and how its devastating effects may be closer than you think!

1. Things are hotting up and
only we can change it...

2. What’s changing....
• Over the next 20 years, we can expect global
warming of approximately 0.2°C per decade.
• Depending on the emissions scenario, a rise
in temperatures between 1.1°C (low rise in
emissions) up to 6.4°C (high rise in emissions)
is expected by the end of the 21st century.
• Extreme climatic events (heat waves, ice cap
melt, and extreme precipitation) will continue
to increase in frequency and intensity
throughout the 21st century.
• The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change says scientists are 95% certain that
humans are the 'dominant cause' of global
warming. (Santer et al 1995; Stott et al. 2000).
• Climate change could have a serious impacts
on global economic growth and development,
and bring huge threats to biodiversity,
endangered species and vulnerable
populations. …… but the effects of climate
change can also be felt closer to home…

3. Climate Change affects the most vulnerable.....
• Globally, millions of people struggle with
uncertain rainfall, especially farmers. Too
much, too early, or too little too late; the
seeds they plant don't grow, or they get
washed away. If the rain comes too late,
the seedlings often die, and farmers don't
have a way to adjust to that kind of stress.
• What people try to do if they can't grow
enough food is try to eat less. But, of
course, there is only so much less that
people can eat before they start feeling
hungry or the impacts of malnutrition.
• The consequences of the earth’s warming
just by 2°C to 2.5°C by the 2050s would
mean 23% in Sub-Saharan Africa and 62%
in South Asia would suffer severe stunting.

4. But it’s also causing havoc closer to home...

5. The result of rampant deforestation is that the earth’s natural
capacity for Co2 recycling is reduced...

6. Humans are partly to blame....but we
can also act to slow global warming....
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•
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If global CO2 emissions (including
emissions related to deforestation)
continue at current levels, they will
reach 41 billion metric tons of CO2 per
year in 2020.
This would result in ocean surface level
warming and a potentially hazardous
drop in plant biodiversity.
In an interview with a local member of
my community, we discussed numerous
ways in which we could all, individually,
reduce our carbon and other dangerous
emissions, and work towards a cooler,
greener world, e.g. regular recycling,
reduced air travel, buying locally
produced goods, using electricity
efficient bulbs, saving water, promoting
green transport, pushing governments
to meet and build on Kyoto protocols
and international drives to reduce
omissions.