Issue: December 2007
“Ultimately, climate change is a threat to humanity as a whole. But it is the poor, a constituency with no responsibility for the ecological debt we are running up, who face the immediate and most severe human costs,” commented UNDP Administrator Kemal Derviş.The report Fighting climate change: Human solidarity in a divided world warns that the world should focus on the development impact of climate change that could bring unprecedented reversals in poverty reduction, nutrition, health and education.
The report provides a stark account of the threat posed by global warming. It argues that the world is drifting towards a “tipping point” that could lock the world’s poorest countries and their poorest citizens in a downward spiral, leaving hundreds of millions facing malnutrition, water scarcity, ecological threats, and a loss of livelihoods.
The report comes at a key moment in negotiations to forge a multilateral agreement for the period after 2012 – the expiry date for the current commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol. It calls for a “twin track” approach that combines stringent mitigation to limit 21st Century warming to less than 2°C (3.6°F), with strengthened international cooperation on adaptation.
On mitigation, the authors call on developed countries to demonstrate leadership bu cutting greenhouse gas emissions by at least 80% of 1990 levels by 2050. The report advocates a mix of carbon taxation, more stringent cap-and-trade programmes, energy regulation, and international cooperation on financing for low-carbon technology transfer.
Turning to adaptation, the report warns that inequalities in ability to cope with climate change are emerging as an increasingly powerful driver of wider inequalities between and within countries. It calls on rich countries to put climate change adaptation at the centre of international partnerships on poverty reduction.
“We are issuing a call to action, not providing a counsel of despair”, commented lead author Kevin Watkins, adding, “Work together with resolve, we can win the battle against climate change. Allowing the window of opportunity to close would represent a moral and political failure without precedent in human history.” He described the Bali talks as a unique opportunity to put the interests of the world’s poor at the heart of climate change negotiations.
The report provides evidence of the mechanisms through with the ecological impacts of climate change will be transmitted to the poor. Focusing on the 2.6 billion people surviving on less than US$2 a day, the authors warn forces unleashed by global warming could stall and then reverse progress built up over generations. Among the threats to human development identified by Fighting climate change:
· The breakdown of agricultural systems as a result of increased exposure to drought, rising temperatures, and more erratic rainfall, leaving up to 600 million more people facing malnutrition. Semi-arid areas of sub-Saharan Africa with some of the highest concentrations of poverty in the world face the danger of potential productivity losses of 26% by 2060.
· An additional 1.8 billion people facing water stress by 2080, with large areas of South Asia and northern China facing a grave ecological crisis as a result of glacial retreat and changed waterfall patterns.
· Displacement through flooding and tropical storm activity of up to 332 million people in coastal and low-lying areas. Over 70 million Bangladeshis, 22 million Vietnamese, and six million Egyptians could be affected by global warming-related flooding.
· Emerging health risks, with an additional population of up to 400 million facing the risk of malaria.
Setting out the evidence from a new research exercise, the authors of the Human Development Report argue that the potential human costs of climate change have been understated. They point out that climate shocks such as droughts, floods and storms, which will become more frequent and intense with climate change, are already among the most powerful drivers of poverty and inequality – and global warming will strengthen the impacts.
“For millions of people, these are events that offer a one-way ticket to poverty and long-run cycles of disadvantage”, says the report. Apart from threatening lives and inflicting suffering, they wipe out assets, lead to malnutrition, and result in children being withdrawn from school. In Ethiopia, the report finds that children exposed to a drought in early childhood are 36% more likely to be malnourished – a figure that translates into 2 million additional cases of child malnutrition.
While the report focuses on the immediate threats to the world’s poor, it warns that failure to tackle climate change could leave future generations facing ecological catastrophe. It highlights the possible collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheets, the threat of glaciers, and the stress on marine ecosystems as systemic threats to humanity.
“Of course there are uncertainties, but faced with risks of this order of magnitude uncertainty is not a case for inaction. Ambitious mitigation is in fact the insurance we have to buy against potentially very large risks. Fighting climate change is about our commitment to human development today and about creating a world that will provide ecological security for our children and their grandchildren”, Mr. Derviş said.
Avoiding Dangerous Climate Change
The authors of the Human Development Report call on governments to set a collective target for avoiding dangerous climate change. They advocate a threshold of 2°C (3.6°F) above pre-industrial levels (the current level is 0.7°C, 1.3°F).
Drawing on a new climate model, the report suggests a “21st Century carbon budget” for staying within this threshold. The budget quantifies the total level of greenhouse gas emissions consistent with this goal. In an exercise that captures the scale of the challenge ahead, the report estimates that business-as-usual could result on current trends in the entire carbon budget for the 21st Century being exhausted by 2032. The authors warn that on current trends the world is more likely to breach a 4°C threshold than staying within 2°C (3.6°F).
The Human Development Report addresses some of the critical issues facing negotiators in Bali. While acknowledging the threat posed by rising emissions from major developing countries, the authors argue that northern governments have to initiate the deepest and earliest cuts. They point out that rich countries carry overwhelming historic responsibilty for the problem, have far deeper carbon footprints, and have the financial and technological capabilities to act.
“If people in the developing world had generated per capita CO² emissions at the same level as people in North America, we would need the atmosphere of nine planets to deal with the consequences” commented Mr. Watkins.
Using an illustrative framework for an emissions pathway consistent with avoiding dangerous climate change, the Human Development Report suggests that:
· Developed countries should cut greenhouse gas emissions by at least 80% to 2050 and 30% by 2020 from 1990 levels.
· Develoing countries should cut emissions by 20 percent to 2050 from 1990 levels. However, these cuts would occur from 2020 and they would be supported through international cooperation of finance and low carbon technology transfer.
Measured against this benchmark, the authors find that many of the targets set by developed country governments fall short of what is required. It notes also that most developed countries have failed to achieve even the modest reductions – averaging around 5% from 1990 levels – agreed under the Kyoto Protocol. Even where ambitious targets have been set, the report argues, few developed countries have aligned stated climate security goals with concrete energy policies.
Scenarios for future emissions reinforce the scale of the challenge ahead. On current trends, CO² emissions are projected to increase by 50% to 2030 – an outcome that would make dangerous climate change inevitable. “The bottom line is that the global energy system is out of alignment with the ecological systems that sustain our planet”, commented Mr. Watkins, adding: “realignment will take a fundamental shift in regulation, market incentives, and international cooperation.”
Fighting climate change identifies a range of policies needed to close the gap between climate security statements and energy policies for avoiding dangerous climate change. Among the most important:
· Pricing carbon. The report argues that both carbon taxation and cap-and-trade schemes have a role to play. Gradually rising carbon taxes would be a powerful tool to change incentive structures facing investors. It also stresses that carbon taxes need not imply an overall greater tax burden because they could be compensated by tax reductions on labour income.
· Strong regulatory standards. The report calls on governments to adopt and enforce tougher standards on vehicle emissions, building and electrical appliances.
· Supporting the development of low carbon energy provision. The report highlights the unexploited potential for an increase in the share of renewable energy used, and for breakthrough technologies such as carbon capture and storage (CCS).
· International cooperation on finance and technology transfer. The authors note that developing countries will not participate in an agreement that provides no incentives for entry, and which threatens to raise the costs of energy. The report argues for the creation of a Climate Change Mitigation Facility (CCMF) to provide $25-50 billion annually in financing the incremental low-carbon energy investments in developing countries consistent with achieving shared climate change goals.
Drawing on economic modelling work, the Human Development Report argues that the cost of stabilizing greenhouse gases at 450 parts per million (ppm) could be limited to an average of 1.6% of world GDP to 2030. “While these are real costs, the costs of inaction will be far greater, whether measured in economic, social or human terms”, warned Mr. Derviş. The report points out that the cost of avoiding dangerous climate change represents less than two-thirds of current world military spending.
Adaptation efforts overlooked
While stressing the central medium-term role of mitigation, Fighting climate change warns against neglecting the adaptation challenge. It points out that, even with stringent mitigation, the world is now committed to continued warming for the first half of the 21st Century. The report warns that adaptation is needed to prevent climate change leading to major setbacks in human development – and to guard against the very real danger of insufficient mitigation.
The report draws attention to extreme inequalities in adaptation capacity. Rich countries are investing heavily in climate-change defence systems, with governments playing a leading role. By contrast, in developing countries “people are being left to sink or swim with their own resources,” writes Desmond Tutu, Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town, in the report, creating a “world of ‘adaptation apartheid’.”
“Nobody wants to understate the very real long-term ecological challenges that climate change will bring to rich countries,” Mr. Watkins commented. “But the near terms vulnerabilities are not concentrated in lower Manhattan and London, but in flood prone areas of Bangladesh and drought prone parts of sub-Saharan Africa.”
The Human Development Report shows that international cooperation on adaptation has been slow to materialize. According to the report, total current spending through multilateral mechanisms on adaptation has amounted to $26 million to date – roughly one week’s worth of spending on UK flood defences. Current mechanisms are delivering small amounts of finance with high transaction costs, the authors say.
The report argues for including:
· Additional financing for climate proofing infrastructure and building resilience, with northern governments allocating at least $86 billion annually by 2015 (around 0.2% of their projected GDP).
· Increased international support for the development of sub-Saharan Africa’s capacity to monitor climate and improve public access to meteorological information.
· The integration of adaptation planning into wider strategies for reducing poverty and extreme inequalities, including poverty reduction strategy papers (PRSPs).
Fighting climate change concludes that “one of the hardest lessons taught by climate change is that the historically carbon intensive growth, and the profligate consumption in rich nations that accompanies it, is ecologically unsustainable.” But the authors argue, “with the right reforms, it is not too late to cut greenhouse gas emissions to sustainable levels without sacrificing economic growth: rising prosperity and climate security are not conflicting objectives.”
ABOUT THIS REPORT: The Human Development Report continues to frame debates on some of the most pressing challenges facing humanity. It is an independent report commissioned by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). Kevin Watkins is the Lead Author of the 2007/2008 report, which includes special contributions from UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil, Mayor of the City of New York Michael R. Bloomberg, Advocate for Arctic climate change Sheila Watt-Cloutier, Chair of the World Commission on Sustainable Development and former Prime Minister of Norway Gro Harlem Brundtland, Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town Desmond Tutu, and the Director of the Centre for Science and Environment Sunita Narain. The Report is translated into more than a dozen
The heavy carbon footprint of developed countries threatens to stamp out and then reverse advances in health, education and poverty reduction in sub-Saharan Africa unless critical steps are taken to cut emissions and invest in “climate-proofing” the livelihoods of the poor, according to the 2007/2008 Human Development Report (HDR) on climate change launched in Brazil on 27 November 2007.
Building on the recently-released Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Synthesis Report, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) HDR, entitled Fighting climate change: Human solidarity in a divided world, sets out a pathway for climate change negotiations in Bali, Indonesia, and stresses that a narrow 10-year window of opportunity remains to put it into practice.
If that window is missed, temperature rises of above two degrees Celsius could see an extra 600 million people in sub-Saharan Africa go hungry, new and more frequent epidemics of mosquito-born diseases like Rift Valley Fever and malaria and agricultural losses of up to US$26 billion by 2060 in the region, a figure higher than total bilateral aid received by sub-Saharan Africa in 2005.
“The carbon budget of the 21st Century—the
amount of carbon that can be absorbed creating an even probability that temperatures will not rise above two degrees—is being overspent and threatens to run out entirely by 2032,” says Kevin Watkins, lead author of the Report and Director of UNDP’s HDR Office, “and the poor—those with the lightest carbon footprint and the least means to protect themselves—are the first victims of developed countries’ energy-rich lifestyle”.
A “nine-planet” lifestyle
Nearly 550 million people in sub-Saharan Africa lack access to energy. Families are left in the dark to cook with vegetation and animal dung over smoky stone fires, while their rich counterparts in developed countries run up the energy bills. Respiratory disease, in part caused by breathing in such smokey fumes, is the biggest killer of children in the world today.
Fighting climate change notes that if each poor person on the planet had the same energy-rich lifestyle as an American or Canadian, nine planets would be needed to safely cope with the pollution. In fact, the US state of Texas, with 23 million residents, emits more CO² than all of the 720 million residents of sub-Saharan Africa put together, says the Report.
Faced with these stark differences, the authors note that critical global emission cuts should not undermine efforts to get basic energy services to the poor. The world’s richest countries have a historic responsibility to take the lead in balancing the carbon budget by cutting emissions by at least 80 percent by 2050, says the Report, in addition to supporting a new $86 billion annual global investment in substantial international adaptation efforts to protect the world’s poor.
“Africa is entering a new century. There is promise. Growth and development are accelerating and peace is being consolidated in many parts of the Continent,” said UNDP Administrator Kemal Derviş, “Getting the fight against climate change right would in turn catalyze significant human development advances across the board. But if we don’t act on climate change, the hope of Africa—the continent with the lightest carbon footprint—could be stamped out.”
Human development “traps”
Current evidence points to a direct linkage between climate change and increased risk of climate disasters, like floods and droughts, and the overwhelming majority of people affected live in developing countries, says Fighting climate change. The authors note that on average between 2000 and 2004, one in 19 people living in the developing world was affected by a climate disaster each year, compared to one person in 1,500 for OECD countries.
In the aftermath of a flood or drought, it is impossible to capture in images the depth of damage inflicted on poor people in Africa. With limited access to insurance, savings or assets, poor households are faced with stark choices in the face of climate shocks that can wipe out crops, reduce job opportunities, push up food prices and destroy property.
In the 1999 drought in Malawi, most poor people coped by eating less, says Fighting climate change. They also used up their savings or borrowed money and sold their livestock, poultry or household items. Then in 2002, when drought hit again, nearly five million people were in need of emergency food aid. It did not arrive immediately, says the Report, and households coped by turning to extreme survival measures such as theft and prostitution.
The Report illustrates how climate shocks can lock people into a downward cycle of poverty. The authors found children born during a drought, for example, were much more likely to be malnourished and stunted. In Ethiopia and Kenya, two of the world’s most drought-prone countries, children aged five or less born during a drought are respectively 36 and 50 percent more likely to be malnourished than children not born during a drought. For Ethiopia, that meant two million additional malnourished children in 2005. In Niger, children aged two or less born in a drought year were 72 percent more likely to be stunted, according to the Report.
Fighting “adaptation apartheid”
The authors emphasize that while carbon dioxide emissions know no borders—one tonne of emissions from Texas does the same damage as one tonne emitted by Niamey, Niger—the capacity of the residents in these locations to cope with the effects of climate change varies dramatically.
As global warming changes weather patterns in large parts of Africa, crops fail and people go hungry, says Fighting climate change. By contrast, “in rich countries, coping with climate change to date has largely been a matter of adjusting thermostats, dealing with longer, hotter summers, and observing seasonal shifts.”
In California, for example, rising winter temperatures are expected to reduce snow- fall in the Sierra Nevada mountain range, which acts as a water storage system for the State. As this threatens the availability of water throughout the year, California has developed an extensive system of reservoirs and water channels to maintain flows of water to the dry areas, while also investing heavily in recycling water.
In northern Kenya, by comparison, increased frequency of droughts means that women are walking greater distances to fetch water, often ranging from 10 to 15 kilometers a day, says the Report. This confronts women with personal security risks, keeps young girls out of school and imposes an immense physical burden—a plastic container filled with 20 liters of water weighs around 20 kilograms.
“Leaving the world’s poor to sink or swim with their own meagre resources in the face of the threat posed by climate change is morally wrong,” writes Desmond Tutu, Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town, South Africa, in the Report, “[but] this is precisely what is happening. We are drifting into a world of ‘adaptation apartheid’.”
Current spending through multilateral mechanisms on adaptation in developing countries has amounted to $26 million to date—roughly one week’s worth of spending on United Kingdom flood defences. This is nowhere near sufficient, says the Report, and it calls on the developed countries to support a new global investment of at least $86 billion annually, or 0.2 percent of OECD countries’ combined gross domestic product (GDP), in adaptation efforts to climate-proof infrastructure and build the resilience of the poor to the effects of climate change.
A pathway for Bali and beyond
Fighting climate change stresses that unless dramatic changes happen both at the national and international levels, climate change will stall and then reverse efforts to reach the Millennium Development Goals in Africa. Existing aid investments will be put at risk because of climate-related events and an increasing portion of development money will be diverted to tackling climate disasters rather than long-term development.
With these challenges in mind, the Report lays out two sets of recommendations. The first set relates to the foundations for successful adaptation planning:
• Expand the continent’s meteorological monitoring network, so that farmers can get better information faster about climate patterns in the region. Currently the continent has one weather station for every 25,460 square kilometers. The Netherlands, by contrast has one site for every 716 square kilometers.
• Invest in climate proofing infrastructure such as water-storage or “water harvesting” facilities in countries like Ethiopia, Kenya, and Tanzania with high levels of rainfall concentrated in a few weeks of the year.
• Improve national social insurance programmes build resilience while protecting farmers and poor urban residents from the worst effects of climate-related disasters. The Kalomo pilot project in Zambia, providing $6 a month to families in the bottom 10 percent of the economy, is a promising example of one such programme.
• Invest in early-warning systems. Mozambique’s creation of early warning and rapid-response mechanisms following devastating floods in the year 2000 is one such example referred to by the Report’s authors.
The second set of recommendations lays out a definitive checklist for all political leaders that met in Bali in December—a pathway for a binding and enforceable post 2012 multilateral agreement that the authors stress will be essential to buttress our planet and its poorest people against the worst impacts of climate change:
• Cut emissions from developing countries by a total of at least 20 percent by 2050 compared to 1990 levels, and for developed countries by 30 percent by 2020 and at least 80 percent by 2050 compared to 1990 levels.
• Create a Climate Change Mitigation Facility to finance the incremental low-carbon energy investment in developing countries to give developing countries both the means to switch to low emission pathways and the incentive to commit to binding international emission cuts. This would need an investment $25-50 billion annually.
• Put a proper price on carbon through a combination of carbon taxation and an ambitions global expansion of cap-and-trade schemes.
• Increase the capacity of developing countries to participate in the carbon market.
• Strengthen regulatory standards by adopting and enforcing tougher efficiency standards on vehicle, building and electrical appliance emissions.
• Support the development of low carbon energy provision, recognizing unexploited potential for an increase in the share of renewable energy used and the need for urgent investment in breakthrough technologies such as carbon capture and storage, while supporting growth and promoting access to energy.
• Allocate $86 billion annually, or 0.2 percent of northern countries’ combined GDP to adaptation to climate proof infrastructure and build the resilience of the poor to the effects of climate change.
• Make adaptation part of all plans to reduce poverty and extreme inequality, including poverty reduction strategy papers (PRSPs).
• Recognize carbon sequestration on forests and land as essential parts of a future global agreement and back international finance transfer plans on deforestation as advocated by Indonesia, Malaysia and Brazil among others.
Iceland has narrowly passed Norway to take the top spot on the Human Development Index (HDI), according to the 2007/2008 Human Development Report (HDR) released by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) on 27 November 2007. Norway had held the number one ranking for the previous six years. This change in ranking is a result of new estimates of life expectancy and updated GDP per capita figures, stress the Report authors.
Introduced with the first HDR in 1990, the HDI assesses the state of human development through life expectancy, adult literacy and school enrolment at the primary, secondary and tertiary level, along with income, based on the most recent reliable data from UN partners and other official sources. Due to shifts in how countries report the statistics from which the rankings are calculated, the Index is subject to regular adjustment.
The Index analyses 2005 statistics from 175 UN member countries along with Hong Kong (Special Administrative Region of China) and the occupied Palestinian territories. The HDI rankings this year do not include 17 UN member nations, among them Afghanistan,Iraq and Somalia, due to insufficient reliable data.
Twenty-two countries—all in sub-Saharan Africa—fall into the category of “low human development.” In ten of these countries, two children in five will not reach the age of 40; in the case of Zambia that figure rises to one child in two. By contrast, amongst the top 20 countries, only in Denmark and the United States will fewer than 9 children in ten reach the age of 60.
In most countries, including Brazil, China and India, human development has risen over the last 30 years, but some countries have shifted into reverse gear. In all, 16 countries have a lower HDI today than in 1990. Three of these countries—the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Zambia and Zimbabwe—have lower rates of human development than they did in 1975.
Higher development, higher emissions
This year’s HDR, entitled Fighting climate change: Human solidarity in a divided world, which focuses on the impact of climate change on the world’s poor and vulnerable, highlights that the role of energy in human development is reflected in the record of emissions of CO2.
According to the Report, the top 20 countries in the HDI emitted more CO2 in 2004 than all the medium and low human development countries combined, while China and India are the largest emitters of CO2 amongst developing countries, together they emitted less in 2004 than the top 32 countries in the HDI excluding the United States. By itself, the United States emitted almost as much as Chinaand India combined in 2004.
Below is a list of ranking for countries according to their HDIs:
HUMAN DEVELOPMENT INDEX
The Human Development Index (HDI), measures the levels of life expectancy, education and income.
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HDI Rank |
HDI Rank |
HDI Rank |
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High Human Development |
Medium Human Development |
Low Human Development |
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1 Iceland |
71 Dominica |
156 Senegal |
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2 Norway |
72 Saint Lucia |
157 Eritrea |
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3 Australia |
73 Kazakhstan |
158 Nigeria |
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4 Canada |
74 Venezuela (Bolivarian Rep.) |
159 Tanzania (United Rep.) |
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5 Ireland |
75 Colombia |
160 Guinea |
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6 Sweden |
76 Ukraine |
161 Rwanda |
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7 Switzerland |
77 Samoa |
162 Angola |
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8 Japan |
78 Thailand |
163 Benin |
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9 Netherlands |
79 Dominican Republic |
164 Malawi |
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10 France |
80 Belize |
165 Zambia |
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11 Finland |
81 China |
166 Côte d’Ivoire |
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12 United States |
82 Grenada |
167 Burundi |
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13 Spain |
83 Armenia |
168 Congo (Democratic Republic of the) |
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14 Denmark |
84 Turkey |
169 Ethiopia |
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15 Austria |
85 Suriname |
170 Chad |
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16 United Kingdom |
86 Jordan |
171 Central African Rep |
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17 Belgium |
87 Peru |
172 Mozambique |
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18 Luxembourg |
88 Lebanon |
173 Mali |
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19 New Zealand |
89 Ecuador |
174 Niger |
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20 Italy |
90 Philippines |
175 Guinea-Bissau |
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21 Hong Kong, China (SAR) |
91 Tunisia |
176 Burkina Faso |
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22 Germany |
92 Fiji |
177 Sierra Leone |
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23 Israel |
93 Saint Vincent and the Grenadines |
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24 Greece |
94 Iran (Islamic Rep. of) |
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25 Singapore |
95 Paraguay |
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26 Korea (Republic of) |
96 Georgia |
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27 Slovenia |
97 Guyana |
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28 Cyprus |
98 Azerbaijan |
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29 Portugal |
99 Sri Lanka |
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30 Brunei Darussalam |
100 Maldives |
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31 Barbados |
101 Jamaica |
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32 Czech Republic |
102 Cape Verde |
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33 Kuwait |
103 El Salvador |
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34 Malta |
104 Algeria |
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35 Qatar |
105 Viet Nam |
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36 Hungary |
106 Occupied Palestinian Territories |
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37 Poland |
107 Indonesia |
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38 Argentina |
108 Syrian Arab Republic |
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39 United Arab Emirates |
109 Turkmenistan |
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40 Chile |
110 Nicaragua |
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41 Bahrain |
111 Moldova |
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42 Slovakia |
112 Egypt |
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43 Lithuania |
113 Uzbekistan |
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44 Estonia |
114 Mongolia |
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45 Latvia |
115 Honduras |
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46 Uruguay |
116 Kyrgyzstan |
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47 Croatia |
117 Bolivia |
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48 Costa Rica |
118 Guatemala |
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49 Bahamas |
119 Gabon |
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50 Seychelles |
120 Vanuatu |
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51 Cuba |
121 South Africa |
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52 Mexico |
122 Tajikistan |
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53 Bulgaria |
123 Sao Tome and Principe |
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54 Saint Kitts and Nevis |
124 Botswana |
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55 Tonga |
125 Namibia |
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56 Libyan Arab Jamahiriya |
126 Morocco |
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57 Antigua and Barbuda |
127 Equatorial Guinea |
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58 Oman |
128 India |
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59 Trinidad and Tobago |
129 Solomon Islands |
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60 Romania |
“Climate Change and Development: The central challenge of our time”In his article on climate change and development, UNDP Administrator Kemal Derviş states that fighting climate change is one of the most important challenges in today’s world and that countries have the necessary financial and technological resources to combat climate change.Ankara, December 2007“Imagine that a huge asteroid is hurtling towards Earth. Scientists tell us that there is a ten percent chance of a collision in 10 years and the consequences of its impact will be catastrophic. Your government advises you not to panic and reminds you that there is a 90 percent chance that the asteroid will miss the Earth. Do you decide not to worry, or do you demand that your government mobilizes all of the resources at its disposal to eliminate the risk? We know that even in this fictitious – although not unthinkable -scenario, a variant of which constitutes the opening of Scott Barrett’s excellent book on global issues, the world would act to find a solution without a second thought. Governments would invest in whatever it takes to divert the asteroid from is predicted trajectory. The analogy with climate change is not perfect. Potential catastrophe for the world as a whole is a more long term risk. On the other hand it would be more accurate to compare climate change to a family of asteroids, a big one threatening us all, but further away, and a group of medium sized ones which are likely to hit the poorest countries at lower latitudes much sooner and with much greater certainty than the large one that may hit us all later. As the final report of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded, climate change is now a scientifically established fact. Many uncertainties remain, but we know enough to recognise that there are large long-term risks, including the melting of ice-sheets on Greenland and the West Antarctic, massive loss of biodiversity and changes in the course of the Gulf Stream that would seriously alter weather patterns and constitute a risk for the human family as a whole. UNDP’s Human Development Report 2007/8, Fighting climate change: Human solidarity in a divided world released in Brasilia this week at an event hosted by President Lula, focuses on the challenge climate change is for development. If average temperatures are allowed to rise by another two or three degrees Centigrade over current levels, we could see an extra 600 million people in sub-Saharan Africa go hungry; over 300 million more poor people flooded out of their homes, and an additional 400 million people exposed to diseases like malaria, meningitis and dengue fever. In other words, failure to act on climate change will have grave consequences for human development in some of the poorest places in the world and it will undermine efforts to tackle poverty. It is the poorest countries that will bear the biggest burden of climate change in the short-term, but they have contributed very little to the stock of heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere. This presents an ethical challenge: the past and ongoing actions of rich countries immediately threaten some of the most vulnerable people in the world. The challenge of climate change will require collective action, with global participation, but justice and political feasibility dictate that rich countries should provide leadership and move first. Consider that if every person in the developing world had the same carbon footprint as the average person in Canada or the US, we would need nine planets to absorb all of the pollution. But we only have one planet. Rich countries have the financial resources and technological capabilities to initiate deep and early emissions cuts. The Human Development Report stresses that putting a price on carbon is the central policy requirement. We urgently need powerful price signals to support a low carbon transition. Huge investments will need to provide the energy that has to continue to support world growth and the jobs for our children worldwide. It is critical that these investments take a form that protects our climate. Even with effective mitigation that starts right now, past emissions make some serious climate change impact already unavoidable on much of Africa, many small island states and the big Asian river deltas. While we work on transforming the nature of our energy and other means of limiting climate change, we must help the most affected populations cope with what is unavoidable without further delay. As the report concludes, future generations will pass harsh judgement on a generation that looked at the evidence on climate change, understood the consequences, and then continued on a path that consigned millions of the world’s most vulnerable people to poverty and exposed future generations to the risk of ecological disaster. While we live in a world where people are still separated by vast gaps in wealth and opportunity and national borders, our destinies are inextricably tied to each other by the one thing we all share in common: planet Earth”.
Turkey in the Climate ReportWith 1.1% of the world's population, Turkey accounts for 0.8% of global emissions - an average of 3.2 tonnes of CO2 per person. If all countries in the world were to emit CO2 at levels similar to Turkey's, we would exceed our sustainable carbon budget by approximately 44%. This is one of the findings of the 2007 Global Human Development Report on climate change.Ankara, December 2007While the carbon emissions in Turkey constitute only 0.8% of global emissions, high-income OECD countries lead the league of "CO2 transgressors". With just 15% of the world’s population, they account for almost half of all emissions. If the entire world emitted like high-income OECD countries -an average of 13.2 tonnes of CO2 per person, we would be emitting 6 times our sustainable carbon budget. Table 4: Carbon dioxide emissions
As a result of past emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases (GHGs), the world is now on course for future climate change. This year’s Human Development Report identifies 2ºC as the threshold above which irreversible and dangerous climate change will become unavoidable. It also explains why we have less than a decade to change course and start living within a sustainable global carbon budget identified at 14.5 gigatonnes of CO2 (Gt CO2) per annum for the remainder of the 21st Century. Currently, emissions are running at twice this level. If these trends continue, the carbon budget will be set for expiry during the 2030's, setting in motion processes that can lead to temperature increases of 5ºC or above by the end of this century---roughly similar to temperature changes since the last ice age 10,000 years ago. Turkey was mentioned in the 2007 Global Human Development Report in a few places together with other countries. The total carbon dioxide emissions for Turkey was 146 Mt in 1990 while this figure rose up to 226 Mt in 2004. With this figureTurkey’s share in total emissions in the world amounted to 0.8% in 2004. Similarly carbon dioxide emissions per capita forTurkey rested at 2.6 tonnes in 1990 but increased to 3.2 tonnes in 2004.
Turkey ranks 84 out of 177 countriesTurkey’s HDI value in this year’s report is 0.775, which positions Turkey at 84 out of 177 countries. In last year’s Human Development Report, Turkey’s HDI value was 0.757, and Turkey ranked 92 out of 177 countries. Turkey has therefore gained 8 places in rank between last year’s report and this year.Ankara, December 2007The Human Development Index (HDI) is a summary measure for monitoring long-term progress in the average level of human development in three basic dimensions: a long and healthy life, access to knowledge and a decent standard of living. These basic dimensions are measured by life expectancy at birth, adult literacy and combined gross enrolment in primary, secondary and tertiary education, and GDP per capita measured in US Dollars at Purchasing Power Parity (PPP US$), respectively. The HDI published in the global Human Development Report (HDR) is calculated every year based on available data from international data agencies. There is typically a two year lag between the reference year of the data and publication of HDR. Consequently, HDI values and rank in HDR 2007/2008 refer to 2005. This note addresses both the apparent change in the HDI between last year’s report (HDR 2006) and this year’s (HDR 2007/2008) as well as the real change based on the latest consistent time series of data. Apparent Change in HDI Between Reports Changes in the HDI values and rankings between two reports result from updates and revisions to data for each of the HDI’s three components; as well as real changes in the level of human development in different countries. For these reasons, HDI values and rankings are not comparable across editions of the HDR. The data received each year from the relevant international agencies contain values for the most recent year available, as well as updates and methodological revisions which might affect previously published data. Consequently, changes in the values and rankings of the HDI published from one year to the next may not reflect real changes in the component indicators but rather revisions to the underlying data used for the calculations – both specific to a country and relative to other countries. In HDR 2006, Turkey ranked 92 out of 177 countries and areas with an HDI value of 0.757. This was based on 2004 data available at the time the report was being prepared. It therefore appears that Turkey has gained 8 places in rank and gained. 0.018 in value between last year’s report and this year’s (see Table A).
However, using the most up-to-date data series from the international data agencies, Turkey’s HDI value for 2004 should have been 0.771; this would have positioned the country at 83 if the updates had been available and were used in the last report. Thus, in fact, Turkey has dropped 1 place in rank (not gained 8 places) and its HDI value has risen by 0.004 (rather than by 0.018). The change in the HDI value resulted from updated GDP per capita (2005 constant PPP US$) and new estimates of life expectancy at birth – both of which are higher than the values used in last year’s report – and largely explain the apparent increase in the HDI value between the two reports. The HDI for Turkey is 0.775, which gives the country a rank of 84th out of 177 countries with data (Table 1).
The human development index trends tell an important story in that aspect. Since the mid-1970s almost all regions have been progressively increasing their HDI score (Figure 2). East Asia and South Asia have accelerated progress since 1990. Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), following a catastrophic decline in the first half of the 1990s, has also recovered to the level before the reversal. The major exception is sub-Saharan Africa. Since 1990 it has stagnated, partly because of economic reversal but principally because of the catastrophic effect of HIV/AIDS on life expectancy. Figure 2: HDI Trends
Longer-term trends in human development The HDI is not designed to assess progress in human development over a short period because some of its component indicators do not respond to short-term policy changes. This is particularly so for the adult literacy rate and life expectancy at birth. As such, it is strongly recommended to compare component indicators that make up the HDI and HDI values over the medium and long-term to ascertain real changes in human development. For example, progress in basic human development indicators for Turkey has been consistent over the past fifteen years. The country registered progress in all underlying indicators between 1990 and 2005. During this period, life expectancy at birth increased by nearly seven years, GDP per capita increased by more than one-third, and the adult literacy rate and the combined gross enrolment ratio grew by nearly 10 and 14 percentage points respectively; the cumulative effect of these changes is an improvement in the HDI value (see Table B).
*Please note that the figures pertaining to these years do not parallel those previously published by the HDRO. Before the HDI is calculated, the component indicators are converted into indices using maximum and minimum values chosen for each indicator (for more details on the calculation of the HDI refer to Technical note 1 in HDR 2007/2008). Figure 1 below shows the contribution of each component index Multiple Dimensions of PovertyThe HDI measures the average progress of a country in human development.Ankara, Aralık 2007The Human Poverty Index for developing countries (HPI-1), focuses on the proportion of people below a threshold level in the same dimensions of human development as the human development index - living a long and healthy life, having access to education, and a decent standard of living. By looking beyond income deprivation, the HPI-1 represents a multi-dimensional alternative to the $1 a day (PPP US$) poverty measure. The HPI-1 value of 9.2 for Turkey, ranks 22nd among 108 developing countries for which the index has been calculated. The HPI-1 measures severe deprivation in health by the proportion of people who are not expected to survive age 40. Education is measured by the adult illiteracy rate. And a decent standard of living is measured by the unweighted average of people without access to an improved water source and the proportion of children under age 5 who are underweight for their age. Table 2 shows the values for these variables for Turkey and compares them to other countries.
Building the capabilities of womenThe greater the gender disparity in basic human development, the lower is a country's GDI relative to its HDI.Ankara, December 2007The HDI measures average achievements in a country, but it does not incorporate the degree of gender imbalance in these achievements. The gender-related development index (GDI), introduced in Human Development Report 1995, measures achievements in the same dimensions using the same indicators as the HDI but captures inequalities in achievement between women and men. It is simply the HDI adjusted downward for gender inequality. The greater the gender disparity in basic human development, the lower is a country's GDI relative to its HDI. Turkey's GDI value, 0.763 should be compared to its HDI value of 0.775. Its GDI value is 98.5% of its HDI value. Out of the 156 countries with both HDI and GDI values, 111 countries have a better ratio than Turkey's. Table 3 shows how Turkey’s ratio of GDI to HDI compares to other countries, and also shows its values for selected underlying values in the calculation of the GDI.
The gender empowerment measure (GEM) reveals whether women take an active part in economic and political life. It tracks the share of seats in parliament held by women; of female legislators, senior officials and managers; and of female professional and technical workers- and the gender disparity in earned income, reflecting economic independence. Differing from the GDI, the GEM exposes inequality in opportunities in selected areas. Turkey ranks 90th out of 93 countries in the GEM, with a value of 0.298. Contributors | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||