Tiempo Climate Newswatch

As the Fifth Asia-Pacific Urban Forum opened in Bangkok, Noeleen Heyzer, head of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), warned that "to make our cities inclusive and sustainable, we need to address economic growth, environmental sustainability, poverty reduction and resilience to climate change." This, she said, requires that we take a fresh look at how cities are managed.

According to a recent report from housing agency UN-HABITAT and ESCAP, uncontrolled urbanization and rapid population increase, lack of planning and poor infrastructure are resulting in environmental damage and increasing vulnerability to extreme weather and climate. Over half of the region's urban population lives in low-lying coastal zones or flood plains. The report's coordinator Bharat Dahiya, from UN-HABITAT, cited a number of obstacles that are hampering efforts to make cities resilient in the face of climate change. Alongside inadequate efforts to integrate climate change into policies and programmes and an absence of city-specific strategies, he said that "inadequate technical, institutional and financial capacities that impede the local-level planning and its implementation that directly addresses the vulnerabilities associated with the impacts of climate change." "We simply do not have the luxury of growing first and cleaning up later," Heyzer concludes.

An international panel of marine experts has warned that the world's oceans are at high risk of entering an unprecedented phase of species' extinctions. Alex Rogers, scientific director of the International Programme on the State of the Ocean, the panel's convenor, said: "The findings are shocking. As we considered the cumulative effect of what humankind does to the ocean the implications became far worse than we had individually realized. This is a very serious situation demanding unequivocal action at every level. We are looking at consequences for humankind that will impact in our lifetime, and worse, our children's and generations beyond that."

The scientific panel concluded that the combined effect of pollution, acidification, warming, over-fishing and deoxygenation is creating the conditions associated with every previous major extinction of species in Earth's history. The speed and rate of degeneration is far faster than anyone has predicted and many of the negative impacts previously identified are greater than the worst predictions. It warned that the rising threat to reef-forming corals may be the first step towards globally-significant extinction. The panel recommends the reduction of carbon emissions, restoration of the structure and function of marine ecosystems, proper and universal implementation of the precautionary principle and the urgent introduction by the United Nations of effective governance of the high seas.

Al Gore, former United States vice president, has heavily criticized President Barack Obama for not giving leadership on the climate issue. Writing in Rolling Stone, Gore said that Obama has never presented to the American people the magnitude of the climate crisis. "He has simply not made the case for action. He has not defended the science against the ongoing, withering and dishonest attacks. Nor has he provided a presidential venue for the scientific community - including our own National Academy - to bring the reality of the science before the public," he charged.

Defending Obama's record, Clark Stevens, White House assistant press officer secretary, said, in a statement, that: "The president has been clear since Day 1 that climate change poses a threat domestically and globally, and under his leadership we have taken the most aggressive steps in our country’s history to tackle this challenge." He cited billions of dollars committed to clean-energy technology, tough new emissions standards for cars and trucks and the lead taken in the international climate negotiations. Gore accused the White House of backing down on climate measures. "After successfully passing his green stimulus package, he did nothing to defend it when Congress decimated its funding. After the House passed cap and trade, he did little to make passage in the Senate a priority," he wrote.