New breed of refugee: A United Nations study has found that by 2010 there will be a need for a category called “environmental refugee” as the deteriorating environment could leave some 50 million people homeless.
Approximately 12,000 global weather-related disasters since 1980 have caused more than 618,000 fatalities at a cost of US$1.3 trillion, with US$567 billion of that incurred during the last 10 years alone.
Rising sea levels, hurricanes and desertification linked to climate change could displace hundreds of millions of people, according to the report. Disasters from climatic change have already affected millions of people in sub-Saharan Africa, India and Asia.
The threats include:
- The Gobi desert in China is expanding by more than 3,900 square miles per year.
- The low-lying Pacific island state of Tuvalu has struck a deal with New Zealand to accept its entire population of 11,600, if the sea continues to rise.
- Average atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration reached 377.4 ppm by volume, up 19% since measurements first were taken in 1959, and up 35% since the beginning of industrial era.
- The 10 warmest years on record all occurred since 1990, and 160,000 people die annually due to climatic change, according to the World Health Organization.
- Mountain glaciers are shrinking faster each exceeding year. Arctic temperatures have risen at almost twice the global average during the past few decades.
- United States energy-related emissions rose almost 16% from 1990-1993, while China’s emissions rose 47% since 1990.
But it’s not just about climate change.
American geologists Roger Bilham and Kali Wallace of the University of Colorado, during a conference in India, suggested that the entire Himalayan region from the eastern Indian plate boundary in Myanmar to the western plate boundary through Pakistan, Afghanistan and Baluchistan could experience a future earthquake of a magnitude more than 8 on the Richter scale.
Further, seismic activity along the Indian plate boundary has become highly active recently — the 9.3 magnitude Sumatra quake in December 2004 came three months after an 8.6-magnitude quake.
Most recently, Muzzafarabad, Pakistan, is the site of South Asia’s strongest quake in 100 years, at 7.6 on the Richter scale. Newly opened fissures and huge cracks were seen in the mountains surrounding Muzaffarabad. As the helicopter hovered over the battered city the pilot pointed downwards to indicate another tremor.
