No turning back: Global warming to affect the world's poorest
The World Bank released a climate report on Monday, outlining that the warming of global temperatures to 1.5°C above pre-industrial times is inevitable – a 0.7°C increase on today’s temperature.
Those higher average temperatures will increase the prevalence of weather extremes, impacting on food security and water supplies.
The report stated that the poor in particular will feel the adverse effects caused by increased average global temperatures. Consequently, many efforts made to end poverty are likely to be offset by the inevitable rising temperatures.
World Bank President Jim Yong King said: "Ending poverty, increasing global prosperity and reducing global inequality is already difficult, and will be much harder with warming of two degrees Celsius…But at four degrees, there is serious doubt whether these goals can be achieved at all."
According the report, the complete impact of climate change is wide and complex. However, the effects will be most prevalent in agriculture – impacting on global fish supplies, melting glaciers and ice caps and limiting water resources in North Africa and the Middle East.
A two degree rise in temperature alone would reduce crop yields of maize, wheat and grape in Macedonia by 50%, and the yield of Brazil’s soybean crop by 70%. Whilst in northern Russia, this small rise in temperature would melt much of the regions permafrost - causing a surge in damaging methane emissions and further exacerbating the presence of harmful greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
In the long-term, the knock-on effects of climate change are likely to be of great concern not only for nations whose economies rely heavily on agriculture.
The increased pressure on resources and rising food prices are likely to have political impacts both domestically and internationally, creating “the potential for social uprising and violent conflict” on a global scale.