LONDON: A failure to get to grips with climate change and associated problems, from ecosystem collapse to worsening water and food shortages, is the most severe and probable threat facing humanity, more than 200 scientists have warned.
The risks will also likely feed on each other — as intensifying heat and drought spur more wildfires and forest loss, for example — “in ways that might cascade to create a global systemic crisis”, they said in a report.
The situation could become “potentially uncontrollable in the future if we don’t act very soon”, said Owen Gaffney, an author of the report and an analyst with the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research.
The survey of 222 scientists from more than 50 countries echoes the top worries of economic and business leaders in a risk perceptions report issued last month ahead of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos.
Both this week’s inaugural survey by international sustainability network Future Earth and the WEF report ranked environmental risks as significantly more serious than other threats, from data theft to terrorist attacks and unemployment.
The new survey also examined how social and political trends — such as disinformation campaigns and the rise of populist authoritarian governments — could make efforts to tackle key global challenges more difficult. Climate threats and associated risks are “very big complex problems that need complex solutions”, Gaffney said.
Alongside that, “the 2020s need to see the fastest economic transition in history” to curb global warming, added Gaffney, who also works for the Stockholm Resilience Centre.
But a new crop of populist world leaders, including US President Donald Trump, tend to look for simple answers, the report noted.
And disinformation campaigns can make it hard for voters to understand issues and push for action, it said. But other forces may help drive the large-scale changes needed, the report said.
— Thomson Reuters Foundation
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