Tag Archives: climate

Climate change takes increasingly extreme toll on African countries

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“Extreme weather and climate change impacts are hitting every single aspect of socio-economic development in Africa and exacerbating hunger, insecurity and displacement,” the UN World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said on Monday.

WMO said that average surface temperature across Africa in 2024 was approximately 0.86°C above the 1991–2020 average.

North Africa recorded the highest temperature – 1.28°C above the 1991-2020 average; it is the fastest-warming sub-region of Africa.

Marine heat spike

Sea surface temperatures were also the highest on record. “Particularly large increases in sea surface temperatures have been observed in the Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea,” WMO said.
Data shows that almost the entire ocean area around Africa was affected by marine heatwaves of strong, severe or extreme intensity last year and especially the tropical Atlantic.

Head of WMO, Celeste Saulo, warned that climate change is an urgent and escalating problem across the African continent “with some countries grappling with exceptional flooding caused by excessive rainfall and others enduring persistent droughts and water scarcity”.

El Niño influence

Highlighting Africa’s particular vulnerability to our warming planet – caused mainly by rich nations burning fossil fuels – the UN agency said that floods, heatwaves and droughts forced 700,000 people out of their homes across the continent last year.

WMO also noted that the El Niño phenomenon was active from 2023 into early 2024 and “played major roles in rainfall patterns” across Africa.

In northern Nigeria alone, 230 people died in floods last September that swept across the capital of Borno state, Maiduguri, displacing 600,000, severely damaging hospitals and contaminating water in displacement camps.

Regionally, rising waters caused by torrential rains ravaged West Africa and impacted a staggering four million people. 

Conversely, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe suffered the worst drought in at least two decades, with cereal harvests in Zambia and Zimbabwe 43 per cent and 50 per cent below the five-year average, respectively.

Heat shock

Heatwaves are also a growing threat to health and development and Africa, WMO said, noting that the past decade has also been the warmest on record. Depending on the dataset, 2024 was the warmest or second-warmest year.

Blistering temperatures already impact children’s education, with schools closing in March 2024 in South Sudan as temperatures reached 45°C. Worldwide, at least 242 million pupils missed school because of extreme weather in 2024, many of them in sub-Saharan Africa, according to the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF.

Beyond education, rising temperatures across the continent are making Africa more water-scarce and food-insecure, with North African countries the hardest-hit.

South Sudan focus

Erratic weather patterns across Africa are also hindering farming, driving food insecurity and displacing people who have already had to flee war already, WMO explained.

Last October, for example, flooding affected 300,000 people in South Sudan – a hefty figure for a nation of 13 million, scarred by years of civil strife and where infrastructure is poor.

The disaster wiped out cattle, adding up to between 30 and 34 million farm animals – roughly two per inhabitant – and stagnant water fuelled diseases. Families who had been self-sufficient had to seek help once again.

“When someone slides back into being fed, it affects their dignity,” said Meshack Malo, South Sudan Country Representative for the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

At the forefront of climate change, the troubled East African country is already dealing with a crippling economic crisis, mass displacement made worse by the war in neighbouring Sudan, as well as escalating tensions at home and pervasive violence.

Fighting in Sudan has derailed the South Sudanese economy, which relies on oil exports for 90 per cent of its national revenue, reports indicate.

Destructive cycle

When South Sudan is not hit by floods, it is plagued by drought.

“This cyclic change between floods and drought, makes the country affected almost a good part of the year,” said Mr. Malo.  

Flooding has worsened and become more intense and frequent in recent years.

“That means that any short rain then can easily trigger the flooding, because water and the soil remain quite saturated,” Mr. Malo added. “So that intensity and frequency makes this situation worse.”

With road access disrupted for aid trucks, UN agencies such as the World Food Programme (WFP) must airlift food assistance – a costly, impractical solution, as humanitarian funding dwindles.

Pushing back  

In the South Sudanese town of Kapoeta, the FAO has helped to reduce the number of dry months from six to two, by harvesting and storing water to protect crops at risk from climate change.  

“The impact of drought is no longer felt as much,” FAO’s Mr. Malo said, speaking to UN News from the capital, Juba.

Worth its salt

In countries that lack water resources for crop irrigation, climate resilience and adaptation are critical, Dr. Ernest Afiesimama of the WMO Regional Office for Africa in Addis Ababa, told journalists.

And while desalination – the process of removing salt from seawater – may be a solution for some, for many African nations it is not viable.

Rather than turning to desalination as a panacea, investing in adaptation measures including early warning systems for action and preparedness is urgently needed, environmental scientists say.  “Considering the challenges in sub-Saharan Africa, [desalination] presents a complex economic, environmental and social challenge, and there is a question about its long-term sustainability and equity,” said Dr. Dawit Solomon, Contributor at Accelerating Impacts of CGIAR Climate Research for Africa (AICCRA).  

“Africa is facing a high climate change bill. Imagine the continent which is struggling economically and then facing this additional risk multiplier,” Dr. Salomon added.

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Indigenous Peoples sidelined in global climate fight, UN warns

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Launched on Thursday, The State of the World’s Indigenous Peoples exposes a stark imbalance: while Indigenous Peoples make up just six per cent of the global population, they safeguard 80 per cent of the planet’s remaining biodiversity – yet receive less than one per cent of international climate funding.

The report offers a sobering assessment of climate action that is not only lacking in urgency, but in fairness. From green energy projects imposed without consent to policy decisions made in rooms where Indigenous voices are absent, these communities are too often excluded from climate solutions, displaced by them, and denied the resources to lead the way.

“Although we are disproportionately affected by the climate crisis, Indigenous Peoples are not victims,” writes Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim, Chair of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, in the report’s foreword.

“We are custodians of the natural world who are committed to maintaining the natural equilibrium of the planet for the generations to come.”

The publication, overseen by the UN, brings together contributions from Indigenous leaders, researchers and the World Health Organization (WHO), combining case studies, data and lived experience from seven distinct regions of the world.

A child from the Badjao Indigenous community in the Philippines sits amid the wreckage left by a typhoon.

Modern problems, ancient solutions

The report calls for a seismic shift in how Indigenous knowledge is understood and respected – reframing it not as “traditional” or folkloric, but as scientific and technical knowledge.

Indigenous knowledge systems, authors argue, are “time-tested, method-driven” and built on direct relationships with ecosystems that have sustained life for millennia.

For example, in Peru, a Quechua community in Ayacucho has revived water sowing and harvesting practices to adapt to shrinking glaciers and drought. These methods, part of ancestral stewardship of hydrological cycles, are now being shared across borders with Costa Rican farmers as a model of South-South climate cooperation.

In Somalia, oral traditions serve as ecological law. The report cites cultural norms such as prohibitions on cutting certain trees (gurmo go’an) as evidence of environmental governance embedded in generational wisdom – passed through proverbs, stories, and taboos rather than policy papers.

Meanwhile, the Comcaac people of Mexico encode ecological and maritime knowledge in their language. Names like Moosni Oofia (where green turtles gather) and Tosni Iti Ihiiquet (where pelicans hatch) act as living data points – “vital  to their survival,” the report emphasises.

© Unsplash/Paul-Alain Hunt

Ore containing copper, cobalt and nickel at a mine.

Green solutions without consultation

The report also looks at how even as the world embraces a renewable energy future, many Indigenous Peoples are finding themselves on the frontlines not as climate partners, but as collateral damage from some of the solutions.

“So-called green solutions often pose as much of a threat to Indigenous Peoples as the climate crisis itself,” writes Mr. Ibrahim. From biofuel expansion, carbon offsetting schemes, and mineral extraction for clean energy technologies, the new economy is often being built on old injustices.

For example, in Africa, the report draws attention to how demand for minerals linked to the green energy transition — including lithium and cobalt — has led to extractive activities that proceed without free, prior and informed consent. These projects often result in environmental degradation and displacement, echoing colonial patterns of land exploitation.

In several countries across the Americas, carbon offset projects tied to forest conservation have also been implemented without consultation – often on Indigenous lands – resulting in environmental degradation and exclusion from financial benefits.

Throughout, the report warns that if climate actions continue to be designed and implemented without Indigenous Peoples at the centre, they risk replicating the extractive and exclusionary systems that fuelled the crisis in the first place.

Indigenous young women representatives of the Sami People at the COP26 pavilions.

Climate change is a health crisis

The report also includes a chapter commissioned by WHO that details how climate-related health impacts intersect with the social, cultural, and spiritual lives of Indigenous communities.

In the Arctic, changes in temperature, wildlife migration, and weather patterns are disrupting traditional practices like hunting and harvesting. These disruptions are causing stress and threatening food security.

Indigenous women are particularly affected by the intersection of climate change and health. In East Africa, for example, women are more vulnerable to neglected tropical diseases such as schistosomiasis, leishmaniasis, and soil-transmitted helminthiases.

In the Amazon, climate-induced biodiversity loss has reduced access to traditional foods and medicinal plants, contributing to nutritional deficiencies among pregnant and nursing women, as well as broader community health vulnerabilities.

Despite these challenges, the report emphasises resilience. Communities are implementing locally rooted adaptation strategies, often led by women and elders. These include restoring traditional diets, strengthening intergenerational knowledge sharing, and adapting harvesting calendars to new ecological rhythms.

Participants attend the opening of the 24th Session of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.

Excluded from the table and the funds

Although Indigenous Peoples are increasingly acknowledged in global environmental frameworks, the report reveals that their role in shaping and implementing climate policy remains severely limited — both in terms of funding and governance.

Indigenous communities continue to face structural barriers that prevent them from accessing international climate finance. While significant resources flow through climate initiatives worldwide, less than 1 per cent reaches Indigenous Peoples directly.

The report calls for a fundamental shift: not just to increase funding, but to change who controls it.

Among its key recommendations are the creation of Indigenous-led financial mechanisms, formal recognition of Indigenous governance systems, and the protection of data sovereignty – ensuring communities control how knowledge about their lands and livelihoods is collected and used.

Unless these systems are transformed, the report warns, climate action risks reproducing the same patterns of exclusion and dispossession that have long undermined both Indigenous rights and global environmental goals.

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Climate change: How mountain communities are scaling new heights

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Investment in organic farming, sustainable textiles and eco-tourism is helping mountain communities in Central Asia adapt to global warming, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said on Thursday, urging greater support for regions often overlooked in climate discussions.

Mountain residents relying on family farming are among the world’s poorest people, said the agency’s Director-General Qu Dongyu.

Speaking at the International Conference of the Global Mountain Dialogue for Sustainable Development in Bishkek, the FAO chief explained that many alpine people struggle with food insecurity, as climate change, environmental degradation and unsustainable use of resources make it harder to access clean water, food and fertile soils.

Mountain communities, the stewards of mountain resources, have great potential for climate-resilient development.

Kyrgyzstan, a Central Asian nation that is home to some of the world’s most diverse and significant mountain ecosystems, is gearing up to host a Global Mountain Summit in 2027.

More resilient systems

“Mountain communities, the stewards of mountain resources, have great potential for climate-resilient development by transforming to more efficient, more inclusive, more resilient and more sustainable agrifood systems,” Mr. Qu said, insisting that the protection of mountain ecosystems is a global responsibility.

More than two billion people globally rely on freshwater from glaciers – a fragile supply endangered by rising temperatures and melting snowcaps, he said.  

There has been some progress – but mountain regions remain strained and increasingly impacted by human-induced climate change, biodiversity loss, soil erosion and land degradation.  

Boosting impact

FAO has worked in Kyrgyzstan since 2009 to help the country withstand mounting pressure on its ecosystems. The aims include achieving sustainable food security and supporting sustainable land and forest management.

The UN General Assembly in late 2022 adopted the Five Years of Action for the Development of Mountain Regions to “enhance the awareness of the international community of the problems of mountain countries” and strengthen global efforts to address the challenges these regions face. The plan will extend until 2027.  

We know flash floods; what are ‘flash’ droughts [Details]

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At the tail end of winter in 2015, the ground in the Wimmera in northeastern Victoria had been a little, dry but conditions weren’t too bad for farmers. The crop season was going well.

The start of September looked promising. It was cool, and there were decent rains

A few weeks later, summer weather had arrived early. At the start of October, the soils were baked dry. Lentils and other pulse crops were devastated.

This kind of event, where drier-than-normal conditions transform into severe or extreme drought in the space of weeks, is called a “flash drought”. While flash droughts are still not well understood, our research studies how they occur in Australia – which may help move us towards being able to warn of flash drought in advance.

wheat/Photo:monash.edu

The different kinds of drought

Scientists typically talk about drought as a lack or deficit of available moisture to meet various needs, such as in agriculture or for water resources. We often classify different types of drought depending on where there’s a lack of water, or what its effects are:

  • Meteorological drought is a deficit of rain or other precipitation
  • Agricultural drought is a deficit of moisture in the soil and evaporating or transpiring into the air
  • Hydrological drought is a deficit of water in runoff and surface storage such as dams
  • Socioeconomic drought is a lack of water that affects the supply and demand of economic goods and services.

Different types of drought can occur at the same time, or a drought may evolve from one type to another. Droughts can last from months to decades, and can cover areas from a local region to most of the continent.

Recently, a new characterisation of drought has been added to the drought spectrum: “Flash” drought.

What causes flash droughts?

Flash droughts are droughts that begin suddenly and then rapidly become more intense. Droughts only occur when there’s insufficient rainfall, but flash droughts intensify rapidly over timescales of weeks to months because of other factors such as high temperatures, low humidity, strong winds and clear skies.

These conditions make the air “thirsty”, which meteorologists call “increased evaporative demand”. This means more water evaporates from the surface and transpires from plants, and moisture in the soil is rapidly depleted.

Under these conditions, evaporation and transpiration increase for as long as moisture is available at the surface. When this moisture is depleted and there’s no rain to replenish it, the lack of water limits evaporation and transpiration – and vegetation becomes stressed as drought emerges.

Why haven’t we heard about flash drought before?

Flash droughts have always existed, and were first described in 2002. However, some particularly devastating flash droughts over the past decade have led to a surge of interest among researchers.

One such drought happened in the US Midwest. In May 2012, 30% of the continental United States was experiencing abnormally dry conditions. By August, that had extended to more than 60%. Although other rapidly developing droughts had been seen before, the widespread impacts of this event caught the attention of the US public and government.

Flash droughts are also increasingly a focus of attention in China and Australia. One of the few studies of flash drought in Australia examined an event when conditions in the country’s east suddenly changed from wet in December 2017, to dry in January 2018.

Anecdotal reports from farmers in the northern Murray-Darling Basin indicated removal of livestock from properties, and sheep numbers at record lows. By June 2018, there were reports of trees dying and a desert-like landscape, with little grass cover.

Sunny side up: Can you really fry an egg on the footpath on a hot day?

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Ah, the Australian summer. When the temperatures top 40℃ and only the bravest or most foolhardy would venture outside in bare feet, there’s a cherished old saying: “It’s so hot outside, you could fry an egg on the footpath!”

But what does the science say? Does this claim stack up, or it half-baked?

To answer this question, we need to understand the chemicals inside an egg, what happens to them during the cooking process, and whether the footpath really gets hot enough to drive these chemical changes.

The first and most obvious point is that the egg’s yolk and white are chemically very different. The white, which makes up about two-thirds of an egg’s mass, is roughly nine parts water and one part protein. The key here is that the protein’s structure changes if you heat it above a certain temperature.

Omelette on road/Photo: Shutterstock

About half the yolk’s mass is water, about a quarter is “fat”, about one-sixth is protein, and less than 5% is carbohydrates. The protein in the yolk is a completely different type of protein, but much like with the egg white, it’s how the protein responds to heat that gives us the texture of fried, scrambled, poached or hard-boiled eggs.

Ok, so how does this work?

We can think of proteins as being long chains of molecules called amino acids. In a raw egg, the protein is suspended in the watery mixture. The chain is curled up in a very particular way, held in shape by weak chemical bonds between different parts of the chain as it folds over on itself. (The animation below shows the folded structure of ovalbumin, the main protein in egg white.) This keeps it stable, and able to mix with the water.

But once it’s heated up, the heat energy starts to break these weak chemical bonds and the chain begins to uncurl, rearrange itself and stick together again in a completely different way.

Suddenly, these reconfigured clumps of protein molecules are no longer water-soluble, so they solidify. This is why eggs get harder if you cook them for longer.

This process is called denaturation, and it can happen to any type of protein. Denaturation is what turns milk into curds and whey, and changes the texture of meat as it cooks.

For eggs, denaturation begins at around 60℃, but this is likely to only slightly cook the egg whites, and the yolk will not turn solid at all.

As you slowly go from 60℃ to 70℃, however, there’s more heat energy available, and all of the egg’s proteins now begin to denature. The egg white begins to turn gel-like and eventually rubbery, and the yolk begins to solidify into a viscous goo, before eventually becoming solid or even slightly powdery in texture.

Get the temperature right and this process unfolds nice and gradually, which means with a bit of practice you can get your eggs to turn out exactly how you like them.

Right, so is a footpath hot enough for this?

That leaves us with the crucial question: How hot does pavement get on a scorching summer day? Does it reach the almost 70℃ you would need for a footpath fry-up?

This depends on a lot of factors, including the air temperature, direct sunlight, the footpath material, and even its colour. Black-painted concrete, for example, absorbs more heat than white or unpainted concrete.

All in all, at the peak of these conditions, on a boiling summer day, a footpath can potentially just about reach the right temperature. But sadly, that’s still not enough to sizzle an egg.

First, concrete is a poor conductor, so it will transfer heat to the egg much more slowly than a metal frying pan. Second, after cracking the egg onto the footpath, the footpath’s temperature will drop slightly.

Tiger Bearing Forests Play a Mitigative Role in Combating Climate Change

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Union Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Dr. Harsh Vardhan has said that Tiger-bearing forests play a mitigative role in combating Climate Change, besides the value of ecosystem services, provided by Tiger reserves. Addressing the Global Tiger Day celebrations at Vigyan Bhawan today, the Minister emphasized that the Tiger is a symbol of healthy environment and there can be no let-up in conservation efforts, as threats to Tigers remain ever persistent.

Addressing a large gathering comprising tiger conservationists, NGOs and students, Dr. Harsh Vardhan pointed out that the target of doubling the number of Tigers by 2022 in St Petersburg Declaration is a moderate target, but even to achieve this moderate target, nations have to be repeatedly reminded to conserve the Tiger. He added that Tiger conservation should be carried out every moment of the day and not celebrated merely as a one-day event.
The Environment Minister strongly impressed three points upon the children present on the occasion – to undertake one small good deed everyday and inspire others to undertake one such good, environment-friendly deed for the protection of environment and Tiger conservation, to live and work for fellow human beings and to put their heart and soul in undertaking such deeds with honesty and sincerity. “If each individual undertakes one good, environment-friendly deed every day, we would have performed 125 crore good, environment-friendly deeds”, Dr. Harsh Vardhan said. He added that the day this happens, India will regain its place as the world leader.
The Minister suggested that there can be no better and positive messengers to spread any message in the society than children. Dr. Harsh Vardhan strongly emphasised the need to instill discipline in children particularly by teachers, which he said, should not be ignored at any cost.
A Protocol for conducting security and audit of Tiger Reserves was released by the Minister on the occasion. A Compact Disk (CD) on glimpses of Tiger conservation through Parliament questions was also released.
The Minister also presented the Conservation Assured Tiger Standards CA/TS) accreditation award to the Lansdowne Forest Division of Uttarakhand, which met the managerial standards for effective conservation of Tigers. CA|TS has been developed by WWF, working with protected area agencies in tiger range countries. A voluntary scheme for any organisation involved in tiger conservation, it is based on 17 elements, with some minimum standards and criteria for proper management of Tiger reserves.
Actor Mr. Randeep Hooda, a Tiger enthusiast, termed the Tiger as the symbol of Indian heritage. He urged people to themselves become the agents of change in this regard.
A radio jingle on Tiger conservation was also released on the occasion by the Environment Minister.
Due to the ongoing conservation efforts under Project Tiger, India has the maximum number of Tigers, along with its source areas amongst the 13 Tiger Range countries in the world. India is well on the path to contribute to the Tiger Range by the year 2022 in tune with St. Petersburg Declaration.
The Global Tiger Day was celebrated with much fanfare. The celebrations also included two “Nukkad Natak” (street plays) by enthusiastic children on Tiger conservation. Besides the street plays, two songs on Tiger conservation were performed by Mr. Sujay Banerjee, an Indian Forest Service officer of Uttar Pradesh cadre and well-known singer, Mr. Abhishek Ray. More than 1, 000 school children cheered the presentation of the street plays and the songs.
Forest Minister Assam, Ms. Pramila Rani Brahma, Minister of Forest and Environment of Odisha, Mr. Bijayshree Routray, Forest Minister of Chhatisgarh, Mr. Mahesh Gagda, Forest Minister of Uttarakhand, Mr. Harak Singh Rawat and Forest Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Mr. Gauri Shankar Shejwar, as well as senior officers from the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change and National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA), Global Tiger Forum, WWF attended the celebrations and also addressed the gathering.

Brief on initiatives taken for Tiger Conservation based on Parliamentary questions:
The compilation of “Glimpses of initiatives taken for Tiger Conservation in India based on Parliamentary Questions and Replies” includes significant environmental information discussed amongst India’s Legislators and Policy Makers in both Houses of Parliament- Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha. The publication comprises the concerned environmental issues and affairs in India in the form of a Compact Disk (CD), which is useful for ready reference by scientists, policy makers, technocrats and other concerned with the cause of conservation and sustainable development.
The report describes the questions and answers raised in both houses of Parliament focusing on Wildlife Management issues which is quite germane for Tiger Conservation in 5 years. Several steps have been initiated by National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) for tiger conservation and protection including legal, administrative, financial, international cooperation and other miscellaneous steps and Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs).