Michael Richardson, Straits Times 16 Feb 09;
THE devastating bush fires in Australia, severe drought in China and the spread of haze over Indonesia's Riau province are linked by a common underlying trend - temperature rise in the Asia-Pacific region and other parts of the world.
They are an unwelcome reminder to policy makers preoccupied with the global financial and economic crisis that climate change is striking now and will strike much harder in future if not tackled effectively by the international community.
Australians, who live on the driest inhabited continent on the planet, are already counting the cost of the extreme heat and prolonged lack of rain that set the scene for the raging fires in the state of Victoria. The final death toll is expected to rise to around 300 as more bodies are discovered. Damage to property and livestock, and the cost of treating the injured, could exceed A$2 billion (S$2 billion).
In China, the world's most populous nation, drought has spread to 12 provinces across central and northern China that produce the bulk of the country's wheat. The China Meteorological Administration has said that average temperatures are at 30-year highs in some areas and 50-year highs in others.
Last week, thick haze from forest fires blanketed large areas of Riau as farmers and plantations took advantage of dry conditions to burn forest and clear land cheaply. This practice, although illegal, has proved difficult to stop. It causes acrid smoke to drift over Singapore, Brunei and Malaysia when the wind blows in their direction.
No one is suggesting that above-average temperatures alone are responsible for these events. The Australian fires were fanned by wild winds and police suspect some were lit by arsonists. However, temperature rise is an important factor. It increases susceptibility to disaster, whether caused by nature or humans.
On Jan 5, the Australian Bureau of Meteorology said that last year was the 14th warmest in the country since records began in 1910 and 0.41 deg C above the 1961-1990 average. It noted that Australia had warmed by about 0.9 deg C over the last century.
The panel of international scientists advising the United Nations (UN) on climate change warned in its most recent report two years ago that fires in Australia were 'virtually certain to increase in intensity and frequency'.
It also gave examples of the impact of global warming on Asia. It said that by the 2050s, freshwater availability in Central, South, East and South-east Asia, particularly in large river basins, was projected to decrease. Coastal areas, especially heavily populated mega-delta regions in South, East and South-east Asia, would be at greatest risk due to increased flooding from the sea and, in some mega-deltas, flooding from rivers as glaciers on China's Qinghai-Tibetan plateau and in the Himalayan mountain chain melted.
The panel also said that death and illness from diseases associated with floods and droughts were expected to rise in East, South and South-east Asia.
According to the World Meteorological Organisation, the global combined sea-surface and land-surface air temperature for last year is estimated to be 0.31 deg C above the 1961-1990 annual average of 14 deg C. This makes 2008 the 10th warmest year since 1850. It is now 23 years since the world has had a cooler-than-average year.
The warmest year on record was 1998, when vast swathes of Indonesia's forest and underlying peat bogs dried out and burned, casting a pall of toxic haze over much of South-east Asia.
The UN climate panel says that emissions of greenhouse gases from human activity, mainly from burning fossil fuels and forests, are blanketing the planet, making it warmer.
Last week, the Norwegian Polar Institute reported that atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, were hitting new highs, with no sign yet that the global economic slump was curbing emissions. Levels of carbon dioxide rose to 392 parts per million (ppm), a rise of over 2 ppm from a year earlier. Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere are now about the highest in 800,000 years, and up by about one-third since the industrial revolution began in the 19th century.
Even if they fall because of the economic slump, it will only be temporary. As growth picks up again, emissions will increase. Moreover, once carbon dioxide enters the atmosphere, it stays for a very long time.
We are seeing in Australia's bush fires and China's drought the grim face of the future as the temperature rises. Curbing global warming emissions and adapting to climate change will be costly. But failing to do so will be even more expensive and painful.
The writer is a visiting senior research fellow at the Institute of South-east Asian Studies.
