Act now to fight climate change, report warns

A coalition of aid, development and environmental non-government organisations has researched, and commissioned the CSIRO to research, the effects of climate change on development, particularly in the Asia-Pacific region. The results of the research showed that the likely effect of rising sea levels due to global warming will be to cause a mass exodus to Australia. The Australian Government is being urged to review its immigration program in light of this.

Australia has made a disproportionate contribution to global warming.

The report found, for example:

• Millions in the Asia-Pacific region will be forced to relocate, from sea level rises up to 50cm by 2070, having an economic impact of thousands of billions. Most affected will be islands in the Pacific, India, Bangladesh, Vietnam and China.
• The climate changes will trigger the increase of heat-related illnesses, while flooding and cyclones will also increase injuries and deaths.
• Water resources will be challenged with both drought, and intrusion of salt-water into freshwater sources.

World Vision Australia chief executive, Tom Costello, has said that it is the poorest of the poor who will be hardest hit. Climate change “fundamentally change the way we aid the world’s poor. It will undermine the value and impact of current aid spending and will lead to far greater calls for assistance from those hurt most. The impacts of climate change will require Australia to respond far more frequently.”

The World Vision Australia Media Release reported:

Victorian and Tasmanian moderator of the Uniting Church Rev Jason Kioa, himself a Pacific Islander, said global warming was as much a moral, social, economic and theological issue as an environmental one: “We’re deeply concerned about the impact climate change will have on the lives of vulnerable people in our region.”

The report recommends that Australian aid needs help the nations most likely to be affected by climate change to prepare for those changes, and to assist in working towards more use of renewable energy and energy efficiency. And, Australia needs to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, while assisting those displaced by climate change.

For more details, see:

• The Climate Change & Development Roundtable reports, particularly the Executive Summary and “Australia responds: Helping our neighbours fight climate change”
• The World Vision Australia Media Release about the report.
• News.com.au’s summary

 

Access to seasonal work in neighboring countries vital for the Pacific’s development

A new World Bank report, titled “At Home & Away: Expanding Job Opportunities for Pacific Islanders Through Labour Mobility”, advocates greater mobility for unskilled workers from the Pacific Islands to help overcome the challenges the region faces because of small economies, remoteness, growing youth populations and low jobs growth.

“We know that lack of job opportunities can contribute to social and political instability in regions like the Pacific Islands where the youth population is as high as 40 percent in some countries”, said the report’s lead author Dr Manjula Luthria, Senior Economist for the World Bank.

“This report shows that allowing some Pacific Islanders access to jobs currently unfilled in the larger economies of the region, could contribute significantly to the economic and social well being of the workers, their families and wider communities.”

“Access to temporary unskilled work in a neighbouring labour market has the potential to transform lives and bring hope to entire communities”

This is Biblical: to care for the alien and the poor. Both Old and New Testaments are full of instructions on ensuring that aliens are paid, and cared for. In fact, Jesus said that one of the reasons for admiitting someone into heaven is “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in” (Matthew 25:35).