From Stockholm to Kyoto: A Brief History of Climate Change
In the midst of the current international debate on global warming, it is instructive to note that it has taken the United Nations and the international community some two generations to reach this point.
A Future to Look Forward to : Youth and Children Demand Global Climate Stabilization
Youth and children, as the next generations, have the right to a clean future-they do not wish to inherit a toxic, radioactive, dirty and carbon-driven world. We demand a clear definition of sustainable energy and time-bound targets for the implementation of a sustainable energy policy that will free us from respiratory ailments, air pollution, climate change and a radioactive legacy.
Climate Change Around The World: A View From The UN Regional Commissions
The most recent meeting of the Commission for Sustainable Development (CSD 15) examined global climate change, along with energy, air and industrial development, as a comprehensive cluster of issues. The risk of climate change commands the most widespread preoccupation of the Secretary-General of the United Nations and the Governments throughout the world.
Confronting Climate Change: A Shared And Global Responsibility
Climate change is recognized as a most serious threat facing humanity. No one is immune to its effects. The impact of climate variability and climate change on human and natural systems poses serious challenges to our objective of reducing poverty and achieving sustainable development.
The Health Effects Of Global Warming: Developing Countries Are The Most Vulnerable
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) states that the increase in global atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) is primarily due to fossil fuel use and, in a smaller but still significant level, to land-use change.
Guiding Principles Needed: Towards A Global Strategy for Climate Change
Ever since I attended the Kyoto Conference on Climate Change in 1997, I have been fascinated by the development of the international debate on this issue. There are few forces that can literally reshape the global landscape as climate change can. Rising sea levels, melting glaciers, lakes that are drying up and rainforests that become savannahs are just some of the changes that are wrought by climate change.
Industrial and Rural Energy in China: Innovative Private-Sector Initiatives Lead the Way
China's massive industrial sector is an economic juggernaut, helping to drive national gross domestic product (GDP) growth rates of around 10 per cent per year. But while the country's highly productive factories and plants may be boosting national prosperity, their rapid expansion carries with it a serious environmental burden and costly energy inefficiencies that are increasingly becoming a barrier to China's sustainable development, thus contributing to climate change.
Now Is the Time: We Must Find a Global Response to This Most Global of Problems
The lines were drawn as the industrialized nations of the Group of Eight gathered in Heiligendamm, Germany on 6 June 2007. The forces mustered to fight global warming were divided into competing camps.
Global Early Warning Systems needed: Creating Partnerships to Cope with Natural Disasters
Every year in the past two decades, more than 200 million people, on average, have been affected by natural hazards. Disasters have caused a massive loss of life and negative long-term social, economic and environmental consequences. Vulnerable societies have been deeply affected, particularly in developing countries with less coping capacity.
Forests and Climate Change: From Complex Problem to Integrated Solution
Global warming has become everyday news, often featured in alarming statements by Heads of Governments, scientists or environmental activists. We now know that melting glaciers, erratic global weather patterns, droughts, raging wildfires and creeping invasive species of flora and fauna in new localities are all unmistakably the effects of climate change.
Consolidating Political Will: We Need A New Vision Of Sustainability
The issues of sustainability, particularly climate change and clean energy, as well as energy security and access, are compelling concerns of our times. Through the issues raised by climate change, the goal of sustainable development has been given a tangible core and a renewed sense of urgency.
Interaction of Climate Change and Land Degradation: The Experience in the Arab Region
The Arab region is comprised of 21 countries, extending from North Africa to South West Asia, over an estimated total area of 14.1 million square kilometres. Its vast terrain includes physiographic features of plains, plateaus, dry valleys and relatively limited highlands and mountainous areas.
The UN Role In Climate Change Action: Taking The Lead Towards A Global Response
Over the coming weeks and months, the three Special Envoys on climate change appointed by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will be making whistle-stop tours of key capital cities to build a solid and sustainable consensus on action over climate change.
The Promise Of Solar Energy: A Low-Carbon Energy Strategy For The 21st Century
In an increasingly carbon-constrained world, solar energy technologies represent one of the least carbon-intensive means of electricity generation. Solar power produces no emissions during generation itself, and life-cycle assessments clearly demonstrate that it has a smaller carbon footprint from cradle-to-grave than fossil fuels.
Climate Change In The Arctic: An Inuit Reality
The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) characterizes the circumpolar Arctic as the world's climate change barometer. The 160,000 Inuit who live in northern Canada, Greenland, Alaska and Chukotka in Russia have witnessed the changing of the natural environment as a result of global warming for almost 20 years.