Climate
change impacts knock back Pacific development by decades, say
advocates
Extreme weather events and other climate change impacts are setting development in the Pacific Islands back by decades, says a group of Pacific climate leaders.
Michael Neilson’s video report for Asia-Pacific Journalism.
Extreme weather events and other climate change impacts are setting development in the Pacific Islands back by decades, says a group of Pacific climate leaders.
Michael Neilson’s video report for Asia-Pacific Journalism.
15
August, 2015
Pacific
Scoop:
Report
– By Michael Nelson
Speaking
in a seminar at Auckland earlier this month, TEAR Fund advocacy and
education manager Murray Sheard said just as Pacific nations were
bringing more people out of poverty than ever before, the effects of
climate change were setting them back.
“The
prevalence of disasters and the increasing intensity of disasters are
effects of climate change, and in a few days it can undo 10 years of
development.”
The
executive director of Oxfam New Zealand, Rachel Le Mesurier, said
climate change was costing the region a lot of money, time and
energy.
“We
spend time with our partners in the Pacific, helping them build
disaster resilience, and then what happens when a cyclone comes in,
such as Cyclone Pam, it comes at such a strength that no matter what
we have done all we can see is all the money and the effort and the
energy our partners have put in be washed out to sea,” she said.
Reverend
Tufoe Lusama, founder of the Pacific Climate Action Network, said the
threat of rising sea levels and more intensive cyclones meant any
development while ignoring climate change would be pointless.
“If
we look at it from a development point of view, we cannot develop
without dealing with the issue of climate change. Because as we
develop it will only be destroyed.”
The
seminar was part of the Pacific Climate Leaders Tour, organised by a
collection of New Zealand NGOs, which brought Pacific church leaders
to New Zealand to raise awareness of the effects of climate change in
the Pacific Islands and to encourage New Zealand to help out its
neighbour.
The
tour began with a breakfast and an evening seminar in Auckland last
Friday before heading down to Wellington and finishing in
Christchurch.
Michael
Neilson is a Postgraduate Diploma in Communication Studies
student journalist at AUT University.
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