Earth Today | Land, ho!
Published:Thursday | August 15, 2019 | 12:00 AM
THE NEED to halt the overexploitation of land as a fuel for climate change and a risk to food and water security has been given urgency by a new scientific report on the subject.
The report, titled Climate Change and Land, was published by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – the global authority on assessing the state of scientific knowledge related to climate change, its impacts and potential future risks.
“This report is an important follow on to the 1.5 special report, which looked at the importance of (restraining) global temperatures,” said Dr Adrian Spence from the International Centre for Environmental and Nuclear Sciences at the University of the West Indies (UWI), and one of the report’s lead authors.
“Land has some options to assist with keeping those global temperatures to below two degrees above pre-industrial levels, but because land is already under pressure from climate change, the options that land presents are limited. It also highlights the importance of the need to act now and some of the consequences of inaction,” he added.
According to Spence, the report – which, among other things, takes account of the linkages between climate change, desertification, land degradation, sustainable land management, food security and greenhouse gas influxes in terrestrial ecosystems – is an important planning tool.
Dr Donovan Campbell, another one of the report’s lead authors and himself also from the UWI, agreed.
“We have several large-scale interventions under way, geared at reducing land degradation, at enhancing food security; and one of the things that we struggle with is the scientific basis for making these decisions,” he told The Gleaner.
“When you take it from a programmatic and planning standpoint, and look at the Planning Institute of Jamaica and Climate Change Division (for example) and their roles and responsibilities, you now have a good body of work – the most recent science – that you can pull on to guide decision-making,” Campbell added.
The special report on Climate Change and Land is one of a package of reports the IPCC is delivering in line with the commitment of world leaders to the Paris Agreement goal of “holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and to pursuing efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius”.
It was approved and accepted at the 50th session of the IPCC, held from August 2 to 7, with the approved summary for policymakers presented at a press conference on August 8.
Among other things, the report champions the need for land to remain productive in the effort to maintain food security and in the face of growing populations and the clear and present danger of a changing climate.
“Land plays an important role in the climate system. Agriculture, forestry and other types of land use account for 28 per cent of human greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, natural land processes absorb carbon dioxide equivalent to almost a third of carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels and industry,” noted Jim Skea, co-chair of the IPCC Working Group III, in an August 8 news release from the entity.
IPCC Working Group III assesses options for mitigating climate change through limiting or preventing greenhouse gas emissions.
Meanwhile, the report is expected to feature in upcoming climate and environment negotiations, including at the Conference of the Parties of the United Nations (UN) Convention to Combat Desertification in India in September, and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change Conference in Chile in December.