State Of Climate 2019 : The Year In Review

The year 2019 was an eventful one when it comes to climate. We started the year hot on the heels of COP 24, and the resolutions that had come off it – the launch of the rule book governing the Paris climate change agreement. However, some things like Article 6, which deals with carbon markets were still pending.

  

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January 2019 was marked by an exceptionally strong drought over Southern Africa, vastly affecting food supply and water availability. The rains had reduced over the planting season and as a result millions were at risk. Australia also marked the warmest January on record. This period was marked by an extremely cold polar vortex over North America, dumping record snow over the continent.

Perhaps this spurred strong climate action in March, as school strikes around the world saw a million children and young people walk out and protest for their future. The Fridays for Future movement also known as the climate strikes, learners all over the world put pressure on their leaders and demanded for strong, visible, actual climate action.

March also saw one of the worst climate linked disasters hit Southern Africa. Cyclone Idai swept over Mozambique, Malawi, Zimbabwe and Madagascar and caused over 1000 lives to be lost and property worth 2 billion destroyed. Beira was particularly affected as most of it was destroyed.

This was also the focus of Africa climate week held in Ghana in March, with leaders asking for definite and stronger action in climate finance to help in dealing with such. Children are among the most vulnerable and affected demographics because of climate change and as such, their rights got a special mention.

April was ushered in by a second cyclone over Mozambique. Named Kenneth, it affected more than half a million people.

Young people continued to rise to the occasion in May, with thousands walking out of classrooms and taking to the streets again in protest against the current state of apathy toward climate change by world leaders.

Evidence of climate change continued in dramatic fashion as strong heat waves hit Europe in June and July, with France recording the hottest day ever on June 28, with temperatures hitting 45 degrees.

Vast and widespread flooding covered India starting from June to October, which was the heaviest monsoon season in quarter of a century according to the Indian Meteorological Service. Over 2 and a half million people were affected and several thousands lost their lives.

Starting in July, the Amazon forest fires hit their peak in August 2019, with over 900,000 hectares of trees estimated to be lost in 2019 alone. This was a particularly poignant period that caused angst around the world as the Amazon is the biggest tropical forest system in the world. Located in South America, it doesn’t particularly serve those countries only but offers its services to the entire world. 

The fires were catastrophic for biodiversity, of which thousands of species remain undiscovered and others are unique to that particular ecosystem.

Suspected to be caused by farmers clearing land for agriculture, the fires not only released immense amounts of carbon dioxide into the air, they also destroyed and completely removed any climate mitigating efforts the razed sections had done.

Forests are the lungs of the earth. Why would you destroy them?

Hurricanes Dorian and Lorenzo also hit the Atlantic and parts of North America in August. The former ties in the first spot as the strongest ever storm to make landfall in the Atlantic. It caused widespread damage over the Bahama and rendered tens of thousands without homes. Because of climate change and thus higher sea surface temperatures, storm arising out of the ocean are now much more powerful and more damaging.

Climate action continued in August, with the Latin America and Caribbean climate week happening in Salvador, Brazil. It was intended to set the path for the global summit the following month and called for ‘stronger collaboration and ambition’.

 The IPCC released the land and climate report in August. It looked at the influence land had on climate and vice versa. The report in brief examined and showed that land through activities such as agriculture, urbanization, forestry and various human generated uses of land affect climate in a big way. Conversely, climate change itself has exacerbated land degradation by increasing incidence of dust storms, droughts, extensive wildfires, intense rains and floods etc.

September started with calls for urgent climate action headlined by the global climate strike whereby over 6 million people lent their voices to agitate for their lives, the planet and ask for urgent and powerful climate action. It was intentionally timed just before the Climate Action Summit convened by the UN Secretary General in New York which was meant to raise ambition for rapid and far reaching cuts in emissions.

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The summit was a mixed bag of goodies. First, major emitters like the Unites States, India and China showed no signs of any ratcheted up ambition for lowering emissions. But there was an overflow of non-state actors like companies and multinational corporations’ intentions and small nations and do their part to significantly lower or completely erase by specific timelines their carbon footprint.

The second report issued by the IPCC was on oceans, cryosphere and climate and was launched in September. It focused on the global ocean and its regulatory role in climate. Life is not possible without water. Oceans play a huge role in supporting life on the planet. However, with rising air temperatures, the sea and all that is in it is affected as well. There are more marine heat waves, fisheries are negatively affected, coral bleaching is on the increase, inland saline water intrusion and evident ocean acidification are also major effects of climate change. The report, found here, also focuses on remedial measures.

It was hoped that COP 25 negotiations would be influenced by these two documents but that was sadly not to be.

Earlier in September, the Asia Pacific climate week was held in Thailand, and emphasized on sustainability, creating resilience and nature based solutions, all in the lead up to the COP in December.

October was reported by the Copernicus Climate Change Service as the warmest on record globally.

Hot on the heels of this news, November was ushered in by the Emissions Gap Report released by the United Nations Environment Program. Released annually, the report looked at the gap between where we are in and the where we need to be in terms of cutting emissions in line with the goals of 2015’s Paris Agreement. It notes that there’s been a rise of 1.5 percent of emissions yearly in the last decade and calls for greater ambition to lower emissions radically, noting that if commitments already in place now were fully implemented, there would still be a rise of 3.2 degrees in temperature.

The last month of the year, December officially commenced with COP 25, held in Madrid, Spain, under the presidency of Chile. Its rallying cry and theme was ‘Time for Action’ though little to none happened in forward moving climate action. It proved to be a disappointment for many, with the crucial issue of carbon markets delayed and pushed forward for yet another year. A lot of other issues were also watered down, as political interests seemed to override ecological ones at the conference.

The year 2019 was formally concluded by vastly intense wildfires ravaging the Australian subcontinent, causing death of over half a million animals, mass evacuation for thousands and stirring political discontent. Covering a huge land mass, the wildfires released huge quantities of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere and destroyed a lot of property.

Perhaps the most stark sign of things to come, the wildfires have proved most destructive, and serve as wake up to the world that climate change is not just real, but we are in fact way behind in combating it.

We either finish it or it finishes us.

2019 passed the baton to 2020 with the record breaking climate change influenced floods in Jakarta. Indonesia, said to be the worst in a decade.

2019 has the dubious honor of coming a close second to 2016, as the hottest year ever on record.

January 2020 heralds the year which given the events of 2019, will likely see more stronger and frequent calls for climate action from a wide cross-section if not all of the world.

In 2020, nations around the world will issue new nationally determined contributions that should be progressive and ambitious. Will all the evidence of the past year be enough to make them do the rightful and needful or will they be a slave to “economics?”

Young people are likely to take on a bigger role when it comes to leadership and activism for climate action but will these calls be responded to? Will they take matters into their own hands?

Well, the wider public is now acknowledging climate change as an issue that needs work in the present, and is not just a problem for future generations.

Visibility has increased, will the action commensurate?

Be more proactive, and be the change you want to see and demand action from leaders.

We either act on climate or it will surely act on us.

Make 2020 the year you want it to be.

There’s still hope.