GermanWatch finds Bangladesh most vulnerable to climate
No commentsCOPENHAGEN–Bangladesh, Myanmar and Honduras were the countries most affected by extreme weather events from 1990 to 2008, according to the GermanWatch Global Climate Risk Index (CRI) 2010.
The vulnerability of Bangladesh is much higher than the two other countries, however, as it is exposed to a greater range of extreme weather events, including floods, cyclone, precipitation and drought, said the report, released on the sidelines of UN climate talks in the Danish capital.
From 1991 to 2008, almost 600,000 people died across the globe from more than 11,000 extreme weather events, out of which over one-fourth were in Bangladesh.
Total global economic loss from this extreme weather was around 1.7 trillion USD, said the report.
Bangladesh, during the same time period, faced 224 extreme weather events, but the fatality rate has narrowed due to its better preparedness for climate risks and larger-scale disasters. Despite these advances, however, the country lost annually 1.81 percent of GDP.
In total, 654 extreme events were registered worldwide in 2008, which caused around 93,700 deaths and economic losses of more than US$ 123 billion, according to the report.
Vietnam, Nicaragua, Haiti and India were behind Bangladesh in the list of ten worst affected countries. Three other most affected countries were Dominican Republic, Philippines and China.
Among the first 20 vulnerable countries there were only four developed countries affected by any climate event, the report said.
Poorer developing countries are often hit much harder by climate change, despite the fact that they are least responsible for causing climate change, it said.
The Global Climate Risk Index report said there are two groups of countries facing climate risks. One group is continuously facing threats of extreme events and the other is facing exceptional catastrophes.
Bangladesh is at the top of the first group, in which extreme climate events are likely to intensify in the coming years.
Analysis of data confirmed that the intensity of tropical cyclones might increase due to a rise in ocean temperature and it may severely affect Bangladesh, the report said.
The Germanwatch Global Climate Risk Index is an analysis based on four indicators: number of deaths, number of deaths per one hundred thousand inhabitants, sum of losses in US$ in purchasing power parity (PPP) as well as losses of per unit of Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
The report focused on impacts of extreme weather events from 1990 to 2008, marking the 20th years of the first assessment report of the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the main UN scientific body to analyze climate change.
In the present analysis, only weather related events – storms, floods, as well as temperature extremes and mass movements (heat and cold waves etc.) were incorporated, said lead author of the report, Sven Harmeling.
Geological factors like earthquakes, volcanic eruptions or tsunamis were not considered as they don’t depend on weather and therefore are not related to climate change.
The report said it is important to distinguish those countries which continuously face extreme weather events from those with exceptional extreme impacts.
An outcome of the Copenhagen climate summit could make a real difference for those countries particularly at risk through the adoption of an ambitious adaptation action framework, it said.
