Report: Climate Change Severely Threatens International Economic Growth
Report: Climate Change Severely Threatens International Economic Growth
Global warming, of course, is a serious economic problem. According to a new report released today by the World Bank, it’s also a problem that threatens economic growth worldwide.
The range of economic impacts of global warming is astounding. From the World Bank summary:
The report says that the consequences of such changes include decreased water availability and water quality in many arid and semiarid regions; an increased risk of floods and droughts in many regions; reduction in water regulation by snow and glaciers in mountain habitats; decreases in reliability of hydropower and biomass production in some regions; increased incidence of vector- and waterborne diseases such as malaria, dengue, and cholera; increased heat stress mortality; increased damages and deaths caused by extreme weather events; decreased agricultural productivity with almost any warming in the tropics and subtropics; adverse impacts on fisheries; and adverse effects on many ecological systems.
The World Bank stresses that we are already suffering from the economic impacts of climate change. According to the report, “in the absence of adaptation, the annual costs of climate change impacts in exposed developing countries could range from several percent to tens of percent of gross domestic product (GDP).” Worse, “much of this damage would come not gradually and incrementally through the years but in the form of severe economic shocks.”
Global warming deniers frequently focus on the cost of doing something about about the problem. But they never mention the cost of doing nothing.
For much more on global warming, check out Climate Progress — our new sister blog dedicated to the issue.
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35 Responses to “Report: Climate Change Severely Threatens International Economic Growth”
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Did Wolfowitz have anything to do with this?
August 29th, 2006 at 4:07 pmBut, But, you can’t prove that man’s activities have anything to do with it!
August 29th, 2006 at 4:07 pmQuick, where’s some sand I can stick my head in?
Ouch, damn that sand’s HOT!
Global warming is real and manmade. A simple study in human thought would teach you however that we are just like any other mammal on earth. We will consume a valuable resource at the rate nature allows. Since we would be labeled as a “super predator” we will basically consume our resources at a maximum rate until they are gone. At that point we will mostly kill ourselves and the planet. While it is very utopion to believe we will somehow not do this to ourselves, human/mammal nature dictates that this just a pipe dream. Sadly, we don’t have many years left. Start enjoying what you got I say!!
August 29th, 2006 at 4:18 pmBut.. but.. I thought global warming was a good thing, because it would make my house in Upper Newfoundland a beachfront property, my friend’s house in Alaska a nice, hot winter vacation spot, and more land would be available in Canada for cultivation.
What gives!?
August 29th, 2006 at 4:19 pmIm sure the Worldbank is really worried about Global Warming, because it will render III World countries unable to pay their debts. Thanks, WorldBank, I wish you could stop being the G-8 toy.
August 29th, 2006 at 4:20 pmRoger, that was a most lucid comment. Until the last sentence.
August 29th, 2006 at 4:25 pmWe have lots of opportunity to do something about it. Look up Tesla motors. Googe Mazda hydrogen engine.
Get busy you slacker!
#4,
There are winners and losers in most of life, same with Global warming. In this case places in Canada surely will have better yeilds from there fields. Sadly, those around the equator will get roasted at the same time. Winners and losers. Its part of life with global warming, a free market, Repugs and Dems, the Stock Market, Business, Life, mostly everything.
August 29th, 2006 at 4:25 pmRUCerious,
I would love to believe we could pull ourselves out of this mess, but our animal nature just won’t allow it. The smart know Oil is bad, yet the smart will still use Oil. In the end, we will use more and more Oil regardless of the environment until demand out stripes supply and it becomes a Lux. Item. Of course mass die off of the human race might come before we get to that point with oil. In that case, we will continue to use Oil for a very long time. Human nature has its plus’ and minus’. In the end, we are just like and other mammal. We consume at the rate nature allows us to. Sadly, we are so perfectly built, we can consume everything and nothing can stop us. Just like any other animal, we will do just that.
Luckily, it won’t kill us all, but it will “thin the herd” so to speak.
August 29th, 2006 at 4:28 pmDon’t report this crap. Global Warming doesn’t exist! It’s made up by Al Gore who is a sore loser and wants to fear monger people into shutting down capitalism!
We need more reporting on the 10-year-old murder of a blonde white girl. Or, if possible, hot blondes missing in tropical islands are good stories too.
August 29th, 2006 at 4:31 pmRoger_Roger…why republicans are useless, they see the glass as half empty but they have to drink it before anyone else. Last to die.
August 29th, 2006 at 4:31 pmRog.
August 29th, 2006 at 4:32 pmWhen leaders lead, people will follow.
When we elect leaders who are not beholden to oil and other big corporate interests, we may be able to salvage more than less.
I, for one, am not giving up with a Darwinian shrug of my shoulders.
There is a huge task ahead. I have two children who shouldn’t be bearing the brunt of our lack of insight and will.
Do you have kids??
#12 - Don’t forget Paris’ new CD tanking story!
August 29th, 2006 at 4:32 pm7,
So we are all going to get roasted and there’s nothing we can do about it? Well, at least that’s better than trying to tell us that it doesn’t exist at all!
Seems like the underlying assumption is that ‘it’ll never happen to me’ (meaning, incidently, that it will happen to the world’s poor). Well actually it already has started happening- witness Katrina, and the floods in Eastern Europe, for example. The thing is, because weather is a complex phenomenon, the effects of global warming are too diverse to happen all at once. Instead there is an ever increasing predominance of extreme weather events, getting steadily more drastic. Global warming is a downward spiral, on an ever steeper curve, rather than something that one day will suddenly appear.
Does that mean we can’t do anything about it? Err… no. If it is a spiral, rather than a single event, then we can at least try to slow down the progress. And if we can’t do that, we have to start working with an assumption that we must prepare for much more extreme weather- meaning we need to divert a lot more funds towards it.
Either way, saying ‘there’s nothing we can do about it’ is like fiddling while Rome burns.
August 29th, 2006 at 4:37 pmIt is highly unlikely that any warming of Canada would enlarge its areas of agricultural cultivation. Most of the country is on solid rock where the overburden of soil is less than a meter thick. The problem is Climate Change not Global Warming. Some places will experiences major isporadic increases and decreses in temperature Also major increases or decreases in precipitation. It is not a simple progression of weather change and it is useless to speculate what will happen. It is best to apply abatement measures to fossil fuel use.
August 29th, 2006 at 5:02 pmWhat the purpose of global financail expansion if you don’t have a globe?
The priority should be the planet.
August 29th, 2006 at 5:03 pmOh your 100% right,
The poor countries and the poor in general will be the first to be effected. The rich, or in a natural sense, those with more resources will be the winners.
And we are just like other animal. Every single animal on this earth including humans will try to take everything they can and will do whatever they can within there abilities. Humans evolved to a degree that we have the ability to take and control everything with nothing to stop us. As a whole, we will never be able to conserve a resource indefinately, not even our own environment. It is human nature to want more and take what you can sadly. America will feel Global warming like everyone else, but we will largely do much better then the poorer countries. It will help that we are a more northern climate as well. We simply got lucky and became the leader of the world’s resources before global warming was an issue. As it gets worse, it will simply be every nation/man for himself. America will succeed with are vaste economic/resource power. Many will not be so fortunate though.
In the end, mother earth will straighten the human race out. It will thin us out and the cycle will renew. This is just animal science 101. Check out the island (forgot the name) up in the artic circle where we killed all the predetors and let the caribou and musk Ox explode in population (we had to “save” them afterall). These mammals simply ate and reproduced out of control until every last drop of food was gone. Then BOOM, there population dried up almost over night and now there are hardly any left. Same works with humans, just on a global scale with much worse consequences.
August 29th, 2006 at 5:04 pm18: *er…sporadic…sorry
August 29th, 2006 at 5:04 pmRoger: Better yet, check out North America where the white Europeans (mostly) wiped out the indigenous populations within the first 150 years of settlement here. Now look at the mess.
August 29th, 2006 at 5:07 pmWell, here’s Roger, our professional troll, once again urging against citizen participation. Go home folks! Nothing to see here!
August 29th, 2006 at 5:09 pmDisagree, Roger does have some valid points but there are things we can do too.
August 29th, 2006 at 5:11 pmAnother example,
One of the lakes I fish the DNR decided to make Bass a catch and release fish meaning you couldn’t keep one. This sounded great as these fish could become trophy quality. Sadly, this science experiment didn’t work. The Bass exploded in numbers but all the other fish in the lake humans could still keep (AND DID). In the end, the lake was filled with Bass that were stunted in growth (they even looked deformed) from malnutrition because they had no forage to eat. Humans always go extreme and wreck nature.
We do this because we are way to good at consumption. While most predators prey on the easiest prey, we are so good we got selective and prey and the best prey. We kill the largest and best game animals and fish. Basically, we kill the very best of a resource and leave the weak and dying alone. This simply screws nature very very badly.
This same thing applies to Oil as well. We take the best resource (Oil) and leave the crappier (Sun, Wind) alone. We are a very bad influence on mother earth. All that aside, we can’t change it no matter how many tree’s you want to hug.
August 29th, 2006 at 5:11 pmForget Roger’s valid points. It doesn’t matter how many he raises. Everything he says is framed as an argument against citizen participation.
Shut up, Roger. People come here to get involved, and they won’t be dissuaded by your sophomoric arguments.
August 29th, 2006 at 5:12 pm20,
Ever heard of Thomas Malthus? A priest/economist who lived at the end of the 18th century, and believed that because the human population was growing at a rate exceeding our capacity to produce food there would be disaster. ‘Positive checks’, such as war, famine and so on would wipe out the ‘excess’ humans and stabilise the population. Malthus never thought that the industrial revolution would bring with it technology that would enable us to produce more than enough food. Not to mention social and economic changes.
Point being, just because we are heading for disaster doesn’t mean we are destined for it. Green technologies are continuously evolving; in order to ensure our survival we need to pressure governments to make use of them, rather than thinking ‘we’re going to hell anyway, what does it matter’? It is the nature of any animal species to ensure their own survival, but that doesn’t mean we have to look at the situation in those terms alone. I always thought that part of ‘being human’ meant looking beyond ourselves as animals…
August 29th, 2006 at 5:14 pmRoger if you don’t want to address the problem, but think it still exists, why are you here? Shouldn’t you be burning fuel or something.
August 29th, 2006 at 5:24 pm29,
Exactly. The fact that global warming is not at the top of the agenda in America is due at least in part to conservative politicians who stick their fingers in their ears and sing “lalalalala CAN’T HEAR YOU”. The idea that just maybe we need to make real investments to dampen the effects of increasingly bad weather is completely alien to them.
August 29th, 2006 at 5:49 pmHey Rog? How many kids do you have?
August 29th, 2006 at 5:54 pm31,
Maybe involving ourselves with developing countries, as well as changing our own lifestyles might help.
August 29th, 2006 at 6:05 pmDoes this mean Wolfowitz and company are planning a war against warming???????
I guess the conservative mindset finally realizes if the word goes to pot, Bye bye the beloved world of money.
August 29th, 2006 at 6:56 pmI tthink you might enjoy this Tom Toles cartoon and how it adresses republicans and global warming
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ wp-srv/ opinions/ cartoonsandvideos/ toles_main.html?name=Toles&date=08272006
August 29th, 2006 at 8:58 pminteresting how to roger, non-renewable oil is the “best resource” and renewable solar and wind are the “crappier” resources.
maybe you should admit it, roger: oil is exploitable and you can make a profit off of it. that’s why it’s called a commodity — because it can run out.
solar and wind, well the energy industry never liked the idea of a limitless energy source, did they? i mean, if you can’t control supply and demand, how are you supposed to make a profit, right, roger?
August 30th, 2006 at 12:09 amRoger obviously has no children. Otherwise he wouldn’t be so incredibly selfish. He would care about the long term viability of our planet. Selfish…oh, never mind, he is a Republican, it doesn’t matter if he has kids or not.
August 30th, 2006 at 9:53 pmStuff economic growth. It’s the last thing we need. We need the opposite if we want to combat climate change and save the planet. Let’s go for a reduction of 5% in economic growth per year for the next 50 years. Then we might get into the ballpark. How do we achieve that? Reduce imports, reduce exports, reduce travel, reduce energy use. Buy local produce. Switch off the air con. Switch off the office lights at night. Cancel that trip overseas. Walk or cycle to work. Put on extra clothes in winter instead of turning up the heat. Ban all outdoor heating, including swimming pools. Use your brains, not your fossil resources.
February 4th, 2007 at 10:36 pmCreating Event Magic through Planned Video Production
Once upon a time, there was a young, stressed out corporate events planner called Tanya. She was organising a large-scale event for her firm’s biggest client.
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