Experts rate 2004 fourth warmest ever
From Paul Okunlola,
Buenos Aires, Argentina
WITH 14 days still to go before the end of the year, international weather experts confirmed yesterday that 2004 has already been assured of a place in the history books: It is the fourth warmest ever.
However, records show that the year is slightly cooler than 2003, going by average temperatures that place comparative figures for 2004 just behind those for last year. Both years though, still trail behind 1998, which retains its ranking as the hottest ever recorded.
The findings are part of a new report launched on Wednesday, "State of the World's Climate 2004", which warns that the rate of global temperature changes since 1976 have already tripled changes recorded over the previous 100 years.
Secretary-General of the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO), Mr. Michel Jarraud, said at the 10th conference of parties to the United Nations (UN) framework convention on climate change, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, that single-month figures had also positioned October this year as the hottest month since formal documentation began in 1861.
The study also comes with worrisome implications for countries in the developing world located in the tropics: Rising temperatures could translate into greater food insecurity and higher incidence of communicable diseases.
The findings came on the heels of fears expressed by the UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, of "worrying signals" emerging on the impacts and risks of climate change, in the light of warnings by top scientists that the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events could be on the increase.
He told the opening session of the conference, chaired by Argentine President Nestor Carlos Kirchner that changes in the development agenda had become inevitable, since the impacts of climate change had become unavoidable.
"We must not allow the consequences of climate change to undermine our work to achieve the Millennium Development Goals," he said, urging the development of long-term measures to help societies to adapt.
"Much attention is now justifiably turned towards the entry into force of the Kyoto Protocol on February 16 next year. The Protocol's innovative use of market-based mechanisms to control greenhouse gas emissions will write a new and exciting chapter in the history of environmental agreements," Annan said.
He noted, however, that "the longer-term challenge is to promote the use of low-carbon energy sources, low-greenhouse-gas technologies and renewable energy sources. In developed and developing countries alike, we need development strategies that are more climate-friendly.
"We need closer partnerships with the finance and investment community, since its decisions, in particular on the energy systems that drive development, can make a major contribution to achieving our objectives.
"And we will need to do even more to mitigate the impacts of climate change. Indeed, without adequate mitigation, adaptation will become an insurmountable task."
Annan, who declared that the long effort to come to grips with climate change had "entered a new era", called for genuine signs to show that the days of delay and doubt were finally over.
But the WMO said that signs that had emerged from its survey of the state of the world's climate in the out-going year were worrisome.
"Globally, the land-surface air temperature anomaly for October 2004 was the warmest on record for a month of October. The blended land and sea-surface temperature for the Arctic in July and the land-surface air temperature for Africa south of the Equator in July were the warmest for the month of July.
"Significant positive annual regional temperature anomalies, notable across much of the land masses of Central Asia, China, Alaska and Western parts of the United States, as well as across major portions of the North Atlantic Ocean contributed to the high global mean surface temperature ranking."
But there were also significant extreme swings in temperatures across the globe. While Spain, Poland, Romania and Japan witnessed maximum temperatures topping 40 degrees Celsius, abnormally cold conditions were recorded in the high altitude areas of southern Peru and in South Asia.
At a briefing on the new studies, the WMO chief executive and his aides also confirmed incidents of altered weather patterns now frequently experienced in several parts of the world, including Nigeria.
"Yes it is true that we have observed some unseasonal rainfall either well into the dry season or at other times when they would not normally be expected. This is definitely happening, but it is not limited to Nigeria alone," noted Buruhani Nyenzi, acting director of the World Climate Programme at the WMO.
"This is not conclusive, but some of these measures were already predicted in the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a publication of international scientists assembled to investigate the phenomenon," he added.
The WMO chief executive, however, cautioned that because climate changes could not be attributed to any one reason or impact, the message to ministers present at the conference of parties was that countries should take advantage of the technology and services of meteorological agencies to plan ahead of disasters.
"We cannot precisely say that these activities were caused specifically by global warming, what we can say is that global warming would increase the risk of their happening," Jarraud said.`
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