Volume 1
Global climate change and sustainable development : third report of Session 2001-02 / International Development Committee.
- Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. International Development Committee
- Date:
- 2002
Licence: Open Government Licence
Credit: Global climate change and sustainable development : third report of Session 2001-02 / International Development Committee. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![mounting property losses especially as current socioeconomic trends are concentrating assets in risk prone areas.''' Unanticipated changes in risk could have a major impact on insurance companies and their investors with knock-on social and economic consequences.''* Climate change could make the actuarial data used by insurance companies useless and the insurance industry may have to develop new scenarios and models for sharing risk globally. Climate change is likely to affect the risk and return characteristics of particular industries and countries, with an impact on their potential to attract investment.'’’ The need for further research 34. Some research work is ongoing. The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) is working with policy makers and scientific communities on monitoring not only agricultural production, animal and plant diseases, and environmental conditions but also climate change through various programmes, including: GTOS (Global Terrestrial Observing System), AFRICOVER (project for mapping land cover in Africa), and the FAO Sustainable Development Department, which produces global climate maps.''* IPCC Working Group I identified a special need to increase observational and research capacities in many regions of the world.''> Nigel Arnell, University of Southampton, told us that the IPCC’s most recent assessment had showed that there were very few studies of the impact of climate change on water resources in developing countries and data on the hydrological conditions in Africa was poor.''® The RSPB argued that research into impacts and adaptation strategies should be done at a local level because local knowledge was essential for proper understanding.''’ Martin Parry, Jackson Environment Institute, said there was ‘*...an incredible imbalance of information available between the North and South...” More information is needed on vulnerability hot-spots in order to help understand likely impacts, the nature of vulnerability, the role of existing coping strategies and the need for interventions that strengthen coping strategies.''* While most of the witnesses called for further impact studies, neither of the witnesses from the Tyndall Centre, Neil Adger and Katrina Brown, felt that work on adaptation needed to wait for more studies.'!” We believe that further research on climate change impacts is needed but that work on adaptation should not wait until such research is complete, given that many of the options will have a positive impact regardless of climate considerations and are worth doing anyway. These are sometimes called ‘no-regrets’ options. Vulnerability Factors affecting vulnerability 35. Vulnerability to climate change is determined by social, institutional and economic factors and their sensitivity to climate impacts, as well as by institutional capacity, the ability to adapt, and location.'*’ As the conditions within a country change, so does its vulnerability. National vulnerability will increase if the main centres providing economic growth are located in vulnerable areas.'*’ For example, those countries whose populations UNEP, 2001, UNEP Finance Initiatives Climate Change Working Group Position Paper. 2 Ibid. 'I4EA0, 1997, Agriculture and climate change: FAO’s role See www. fao.org a Report of IPCC Working Group I: Summary for Policy Makers, 2001 Q43 'I7Ey 148 [para 3.1 and 3.2] '8Q73 and Q75 !9Qq 74-75 EY 59 and Report of IPCC Working Group II: Summary for Policy Makers, 2001 Ev 60](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b32221356_0001_0031.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
