Jules Siedenburg, Kimberly Pfeifer, and Kelly Hauser
Publication Date:
11-2009
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Oxfam Publishing
Abstract:
Worldwide, 1.7 billion small-scale farmers and pastoralists are highly vulnerable to climate change impacts. They live on marginal rural lands characterised by conditions such as low rainfall, sloping terrain, fragile soils, and poor market access, primarily in Africa and Asia. Such farmers are vulnerable because their farms depend directly on rainfall and temperature, yet they often have little savings and few alternative options if their crops fail or livestock die.
Bolivia is particularly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change for six basic reasons: It is one of the poorest countries in Latin America and suffers from one of the worst patterns of inequality. Low-income groups in developing countries are the most exposed to climate change impacts. It is the country in South America with the highest percentage of indigenous people, where much of the poverty and inequality is concentrated. It is one of the most bio-diverse countries in the world, with a wide variety of ecosystems that are vulnerable to different impacts from climate change. More than half of the country is Amazonian, with high levels of deforestation which adds to the vulnerability to flooding. Located in a climatically volatile region, it is one of the countries in the world most affected by 'natural' disasters in recent years. It is home to about twenty per cent of the world's tropical glaciers, which are retreating more quickly than predicted by many experts.
Topic:
Climate Change and Development
Political Geography:
South America, Latin America, Bolivia, and Amazon Basin
Copenhagen was a unique opportunity to turn the world's course away from climate disaster, towards a safe future for all of us on this small planet. Massive global public mobilization demanded it. But leaders of the major powers negotiated for their national interests, instead of safeguarding our shared destiny.
Topic:
Climate Change, Development, Poverty, and Treaties and Agreements
Vietnam is among the countries worst affected by the adverse effects of climate change, especially in coastal and low-land regions. Already an average of one million Vietnamese are affected annually by disasters including flooding in the Mekong Delta region. Serious droughts also affect the central coast region, Mekong Delta and mountainous areas. Climate change is recognized by the Government of Viet Nam as a major challenge, and the National Target Programme to Respond to Climate Change (NTP-RCC) was approved in December 2008.
Topic:
Climate Change, Development, Environment, and Gender Issues
“World leaders all over the world can work together to find the best solutions for our green globe in the UN summit on climate change this coming December” is the key message that young people in Vietnam wish to say to the Heads of State joining COP15 in Copenhagen in December 2009.
In failing to tackle climate change with urgency, rich countries are effectively violating the human rights of millions of the world's poorest people. Continued excessive greenhouse-gas emissions primarily from industrialised nations are – with scientific certainty – creating floods, droughts, hurricanes, sea-level rise, and seasonal unpredictability. The result is failed harvests, disappearing islands, destroyed homes, water scarcity, and deepening health crises, which are undermining millions of peoples' rights to life, security, food, water, health, shelter, and culture. Such rights violations could never truly be remedied in courts of law. Human-rights principles must be put at the heart of international climate-change policy making now, in order to stop this irreversible damage to humanity's future.
A destructive combination of earthquakes, floods, droughts and other hazards make South Asia is the world's most disaster-prone region. The effects are aggravated by climate change, unsuitable social and development policies, and environmental degradation. The effect is to slow or block development and keep millions trapped in poverty.
Topic:
Climate Change, Disaster Relief, and Natural Disasters
The year 2008 is halfway to the deadline for reaching the Millennium Development Goals. Despite some progress, they will not be achieved if current trends continue. Aid promises are predicted to be missed by $30bn, at a potential cost of 5 million lives. Starting with the G8 meeting in Japan, rich countries must use a series of high-profile summits in 2008 to make sure the Goals are met, and to tackle both climate change and the current food crisis. Economic woes must not be used as excuses: rich countries' credibility is on the line.
Topic:
Agriculture, Climate Change, International Political Economy, International Trade and Finance, and Poverty
The current biofuel policies of rich countries are neither a solution to the climate crisis nor the oil crisis, and instead are contributing to a third: the food crisis. In poor countries, biofuels may offer some genuine development opportunities, but the potential economic, social, and environmental costs are severe, and decision makers should proceed with caution.
Topic:
Agriculture, Climate Change, Energy Policy, and Oil
In every society, women and men have different roles inside and outside the household, and different resources to deliver them. In the rural communities of developing countries where Oxfam works, men's roles typically focus on earning cash, by growing food, trading, or selling their labour. But it is largely the role of women to provide the food, fuel, water, and care that the family needs (all for no pay), in addition to earning some cash. In such communities, women are likely to have: greater reliance on natural resources – like rivers, wells, reliable rainfall, and forests fewer physical resources – such as land, fertilizer or irrigation, and fewer assets (like machinery, or a bicycle) to use to make money, or to sell as a last resort fewer financial resources – little cash, savings or access to credit, and less access to markets that give a good price for their goods less powerful social resources – due to social and cultural norms that limit their mobility and their voice in decision-making, reinforce traditional roles, and put them at risk of violence fewer human resources – due to having less education, fewer opportunities for training, and less access to official information.
Topic:
Climate Change, Gender Issues, and Non-Governmental Organization