Climate Change

Slides prepared by Ms. Syeda

Fatimee- 42nd CTP, FSP
Currency of the Topic

Monday February 17, 2014

• ISLAMABAD: “The recent disasters were a warning from

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Slides prepared by Ms. Syeda
nature that there is an urgent need to adopt a mechanism

to face the unpredictability of climate change”

 Currency of the Topic
BBC News Asia 16 Feb, 2014
• Secretary of State, USA -. John Kerry has urged the global
community to act against the climate change during his visit to
Indonesia.
• He said that there was scientific proof of climate change

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threatening not only the environment, but also the world
economy.
• He said “The window of time is still open" to prevent the worst
consequences, but it was closing.
 Currency of the Topic

Sir David King- Chief Scientist of UK, State that;

“climate change is the most severe problem that we are facing

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today more serious than the threat of terrorism”.

Source: Monthly Journal 2010-12 ICUN in Pakistan

Global Warming
• one of the biggest threats to our planet in this century.
• due to the increase of the GHG’s in our outer atmosphere, the
earth’s temperature has warmed by 0.74 degree Celsius over
the last 100 years. - devastating disruption of the earth’s
climatic processes, leading to floods, famines, droughts and

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Slides prepared by Ms. Syeda
cyclones among other natural disasters.
 Green House Effect
• a natural process -the earth retains some of the energy of the
sunrays, and utilizes it to warm it enough to sustain life on it.
• This process is mediated by the presence of some gases in the
Earth’s surroundings, that form a layer around it, and are known as
Greenhouse Gases (GHG’s).

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Slides prepared by Ms. Syeda
• The human activities like burning of fossil fuels, excessive smoke
discharges from factories and the depletion of forests have led to
an increase in the concentration of the Greenhouse Gases(GHG’s),
mainly carbon dioxide, Methane and Nitrous oxide, in the Earth’s
outer atmosphere, , which are responsible for trapping excessive
heat inside the environment and thus increasing the overall
temperature of the earth.
Main impacts of GW
• 1. impact on environment
• Shrinking habitats (forests and wetlands)
• Desertification
• Damage to aquatic ecosystems
• Upward migration of plant and animal species
• extinction of certain species
• Change in growing season of plants

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Slides prepared by Ms. Syeda
2. Extremities In Weather
• cyclones and hurricanes
• floods and heavy snowfalls
• Severe droughts long summers and short winters
3. Impact On Water Reservoirs
• Decrease in fresh water supply
• melting of glaciers
• Rising sea levels
• Increased water loss from reservoirs due to dryness
Climate change and Pakistan
• An autonomous country that occupies a strategic location in South
Asia,
• with a wide variety of landscapes
• On the southern side, the country has a coastline border of 1046 km
along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman while the northern side
exhibits the awesome glaciated mountains that attract mountain
climbers from all over the world.
• The major portion of the Pakistani land is dry and barren, mainly
because of the great variability in the climatic parameters.

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Slides prepared by Ms. Syeda
• The major water resource of Pakistan is the melting snow from the
Himalayan glaciers, as well the heavy monsoon rainfalls.
• Pakistan- contributes very little to the overall emissions of the
Greenhouse Gases, yet it remains one of the most severely hit
countries.
• Global warming has affected the climate of Pakistan in the following
manners.
• Melting of glaciers
• Recuurent floodings
• Droughts
• Climate changes are costing the economy $14 billion a year, which is
almost 5% of the GDP.
 Climate change and Pakistan
• The important climate change threats to Pakistan are:
1. Considerable increase in the frequency and intensity of extreme
weather events, coupled with erratic monsoon rains causing
frequent and intense floods and droughts;
2. Projected recession of the Hindu Kush-Karakoram-Himalayan (HKH)

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glaciers due to global warming and carbon soot deposits from trans-
boundary pollution sources, threatening water inflows into the Indus
River System (IRS);
3. Increased siltation of major dams caused by more frequent and
intense floods;
4. Rising temperatures resulting in enhanced heat and water-stressed
conditions, particularly in arid and semi-arid regions, leading to
reduced agricultural productivity;
5. Further decrease in the already scanty forest cover, from too rapid
change in climatic conditions to allow natural migration of adversely
affected plant species;
Climate change and Pakistan
• The important climate change threats to Pakistan are:
6. Increased intrusion of saline water in the Indus delta,
adversely affecting coastal agriculture, mangroves and the
breeding grounds of fish;

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7. Threat to coastal areas due to projected sea level rise and
increased cyclonic activity due to higher sea surface
temperatures;
8. Increased stress between upper riparian and lower
riparian regions in relation to sharing of water resources;
9. Increased health risks and climate change induced
migration.
Pakistan and Climate Change
• Major impacts in the history
1. Floods
economy - crippled heavily by devastating and repetitive floods during
the last decade.
In the past 10 years, Pakistan has been hit by floods almost every year.
However, the floods of 2010 and 2011 have emerged as the biggest
catastrophes in the country’s history.
• The flood of 2010 -one of the biggest tragedies in the world’s

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history,
• with 20 million people affected.
• approximately 1,781 deaths
• injured 2,966 people
• destroyed more than 1.89 million homes.
• 2011 floods
• wrecked havoc
• affected 5.3 million people
• 1.2 million homes in Sindh
• inundating 1.7 million acres of arable land.
 Pakistan and Climate Change
2. Droughts
• a period of abnormally dry weather due to the lack of rainfall.
• The chief characteristic - a decrease of water availability in a
particular period and over a particular area.
• Pakistan’s economy has been punched heavily by the continuous
spell of droughts for the last many years, particularly in the

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Slides prepared by Ms. Syeda
provinces of Baluchistan and Sind- reduced the river flows,
resulting in drying up of the irrigation canals, leading to a severe
agricultural deprivation.
• Immense losses to poultry and other animals
• causing a general deficiency of food and water for people.
• a mismanagement of the water reservoirs
Pakistan and Climate Change
3. Rising Temperatures In Pakistan
• the annual mean surface temperatures in Pakistan have been
steadily increasing during the past century.
• A rise in mean temperature of 0.6-1°C in the coastal areas
along with a 0.5 to 0.7% increase in solar radiation over

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southern half of country has been observed.
• In central Pakistan, a 3-5% decrease in cloud cover with
increasing hours of sunshine have also been responsible for
increasing the temperatures.
• Heat wave of 2010 -a city in Sind faced the temperature of
53.5 °C ,the hottest temperature ever recorded in Asia and the
fourth highest temperature ever recorded in the world .
• The summer of 2010 caused a temperature of above 50 °C in
twelve cities of Pakistan.
• resulted in the death of at least 18 people.
Pakistan and Climate Change
4. Rising Sea Levels
• a progressive melting of glaciers- a gradual increase in the sea
levels.
• According to the Karachi Tidal Station, an increase in the mean
sea level at a rate of 1.1 mm/yr has been recorded during the

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Slides prepared by Ms. Syeda
past 100 years.
• The ravaging sea continues to engulf the surrounding land, and
consumes 80 acres a day on an average.
• Six subdivisions of Thatta, which were previously considered
extremely prosperous due to extensive agriculture, are now
amongst the poorest parts of the country due to the
engulfment by the sea.
Pakistan and Climate Change
5. food security
• When all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic
access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food to meet their dietary
needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life
• Pakistan faces a severe crisis regarding the food security issues.

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• Grave state of malnutrition as catastrophic climatic events resulting
because of the process of global warming have destroyed the food
resources and halted its availability to the masses.
• the death of 20 malnourished women and girls occurring as a result
of a stampede to get sacks of rice in Karachi.
• 2010- a man blew himself up at the office of United Nations World
Food Program(WFP) in Islamabad, killing 5 employees.
 Global Efforts
• Starting in the 1970s, climate science matured, building on
advances in numerical modeling and satellite imaging. But to
understand and prepare for the challenges of climate change,
we needed to share scientific knowledge beyond borders.
• That's why, at the G7’s request, the United Nations set up the

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Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in
November 1988.
• The IPCC’s role is to publish reports that provide a clear and up-
to-date picture of the current state of scientific knowledge
relating to climate change
 Global Efforts
June 1992 – Rio Earth Summit
• The second Earth Summit- Following the conference, 166
countries signed the United Nations Framework Convention on
Climate Change (UNFCCC), which acknowledges humanity’s role
in global warming.

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Slides prepared by Ms. Syeda
• Every year, a Conference of the Parties (COP) brings together all
of the countries that have ratified the Convention, which now
total 195.
 Global Efforts
December 1997 – Kyoto Protocol
• This international emission reduction agreement was adopted
on December 11, 1997, at the third Conference of the Parties, in
Kyoto, Japan.
• However, it didn’t come into effect until February 2005, because

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it needed to be ratified by at least 55 countries accounting for at
least 55% of the world’s emissions.
• The goal was to reduce emissions of six greenhouse gases by
5.2% between 2008 and 2012, based on 1990 levels. An
international carbon market was established to help achieve this
goal
• The Kyoto Protocol has not been ratified by the United States.
Global Efforts
January 2005 – Launch of the European Union Emissions Trading
System
• In January 2005, the European Union set up its own
emissions trading scheme
• Then, in December 2008, the European Union adopted a series

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of legislative measures, known as the Energy and Climate
Package, which sets three targets for 2020: reduce greenhouse
emissions by 20%, increase the share of renewable energies in
the energy mix to 20% and improve energy efficiency by 20%.
This is referred to as the “3 x 20” objective.
Global Efforts
December 2009 – Copenhagen Climate Change Conference
• The parties to the UNFCCC met in Copenhagen in December
2009 to forge a new agreement to succeed the Kyoto Protocol.
• Although often considered a failure, the Copenhagen

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conference can be credited with officially defining the maximum
acceptable increase in global temperature as 2°C above pre-
industrial levels.
• However, the participants were unable to reach a binding
agreement on greenhouse gas emission reduction targets to
keep global warming below this threshold.
Global Efforts
• December 2010 – Cancun Climate Change Conference
• At the UN Climate Change Conference in Cancun, Mexico,
• the parties agreed to establish the Green Climate Fund- endowed
with $100 billion a year from 2020
• to help developing countries combat climate change and
deforestation.

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June 2012 – Rio+20 Conference
• Twenty years after the Earth Summit that brought climate
change to the international community’s attention- Rio de
Janeiro hosted the fifth United Nations Conference
on Sustainable Development, which was attended by
government leaders and civil society representatives.
Global Efforts
21st Conference of Parties- COP 21
• international political response to climate change began at the Rio
Earth Summit in 1992, where the ‘Rio Convention’ included the
adoption of the UN Framework on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
• UNFCC- set out a framework for action aimed at
• stabilising atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases (GHGs) to
avoid “dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.”

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• The UNFCCC which entered into force on 21 March 1994, now has a
near-universal membership of 195 parties.
• Main objective of annual COP is to review the Convention’s
implementation.
• The first COP Berlin in 1995
• COP3- Kyoto Protocol was adopted,
• COP11 -Montreal Action Plan was produced,
• COP15 in Copenhagen where an agreement to success Kyoto Protocol
was unfortunately not realised
• COP17 in Durban where the Green Climate Fund was created.
Global Efforts
21st Conference of Parties- COP 21
• In 2015 COP21, also known as the 2015 Paris Climate
Conference- aimed to achieve a legally binding and universal
agreement on climate, with the aim of keeping global warming
below 2°C.
• representatives of the 196 parties attended

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• Entry into force when joined by at least 55 countries which
together represent at least 55 percent of global greenhouse
emissions.
• On 22 April 2016 (Earth Day), 174 countries signed the
agreement in New York, and began adopting it within their own
legal systems (through ratification, acceptance, approval, or
accession).
Global Efforts
21st Conference of Parties- COP 21
• calls for zero net anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions to be
the parties will also "pursue efforts to" limit the temperature
increase to 1.5 °C. The 1.5 °C goal will require zero emissions
sometime between 2030 and 2050
• Prior to the conference, 146 national climate panels publicly

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presented draft national climate contributions (called "Intended
Nationally Determined Contributions", INDCs).
• ] The agreement establishes a "global stocktake" which revisits
the national goals to "update and enhance" them every five
years beginning 2023.
• However, no detailed timetable or country-specific goals for
emissions were incorporated into the Paris Agreement – as
opposed to the previous Kyoto Protocol.
 Conclusion
• The erroneous activities of the humans have finally started to take a
toll on the earth’s environment, leading to the formation of a volatile
and capricious atmosphere, which is liable to be detrimental for the
humanity itself in the form of unpredictable catalytic climatic events.
• The example of such recent events include the destructive Hurricane
Katrina of 2005 in the U.S, the ravaging droughts of 2006 in Australia
and China, and of 2011 in Texas, the floods of 2010 and 2011 in
Pakistan, and of 2012 in Spain, and the 2010 Northern Hemisphere

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summer, which killed over 2000 people.
• Research studies - changing weather patterns will be the foundation
for more intense and prolonged droughts and heat waves.
• Meanwhile, tremendous precipitation events will become more
frequent and future tropical cyclones will become more strong.
• A growing consensus that steps will have to be taken to uproot the
cause of these events.
• In addition to the formation of well thought flood and drought
prevention policies, steps to reduce the overall emission of green
house gases have to be taken so that the planet Earth and its
inhabitants can survive.