01/08/2021

(USA TIME) UNESCO Says Australia's Great Barrier Reef Isn't In Danger Yet. Many Environmentalists And Divers Disagree

TIME - Amy Gunia

Aerial view of heart-shaped Heart Reef, part of the Great Barrier Reef of the Whitsundays in the Coral sea, Queensland, Australia. Arterra/Universal Images Group/Getty Images

Tony Fontes first went scuba diving at the Great Barrier Reef in 1979 on a trip to Australia. Fontes, a native Californian, was so entranced that he decided to stay and work as a dive instructor at Airlie Beach, a coastal resort town in Queensland that serves as a gateway to the reef.

“The marine life and the quality of coral was unmatched,” he says, “and the clarity of the water was a diver’s dream come true—and that’s what sticks with me.”

But over the last four decades, the 68-year-old has watched the health of the reef decline. So on Friday, when the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) committee decided to delay a decision to label the reef “in danger”—following an intensive lobbying effort by the Australian government—Fontes was both surprised and disappointed.

“I thought at last this is going to get the attention of people both within and outside Australia and the reef will get the kind of protection it needs,” he says.

Saving the Great Barrier Reef

Stretching some 1,420 miles along northeast coast of Australia, the reef is the world’s largest coral reef ecosystem and can be seen from space. UNESCO first warned in 2014 that an “in danger” listing was being considered for it. A conservation plan bought the Australian government some time, but improvements in the reef’s health haven’t come quick enough.

On June 21, the U.N. body recommended that the Great Barrier Reef be placed on a list of World Heritage sites that are “in danger,” citing climate change as “the most serious threat” to the site.

Great Barrier Reef, north-east of Port Douglas, Queensland, Australia, Western Pacific Ocean Coral, mostly of the genus Acropora. Francois Gohier—VWPics/Universal Images Group/Getting Images

The move prompted a fierce backlash from the Australian government.

The reef is one of the country’s top tourist spots; it attracted almost three million visitors a year before Australia closed its borders due to the pandemic, bringing in billions of tourism dollars and creating tens of thousands of jobs. That isn’t likely to return in a post-pandemic world if the reef is a protected site.

“This draft recommendation has been made without examining the reef first hand, and without the latest information,” Sussan Ley, Australia’s minister for the environment, said in a June 22 statement. She noted an investment of $3 billion Australian dollars (about $2.2 billion U.S. dollars) in reef protection.

Days later, UNESCO defended its announcement. “It is really a call for action,” Mechtild Rössler, director of UNESCO’s World Heritage Centre in Paris, told media during an online briefing. “The whole world needs to know there’s a site that’s under threat and we all have a duty to preserve [it] for generations to come.”

Following UNESCO’s notice, Ley embarked on an 8-day lobbying trip to Europe, where she met representatives of 18 countries and won her government a reprieve. On July 23, the 21-country World Heritage Committee agreed to delay the decision, and instead asked Australia to deliver a report on the state of the reef in Feb. 2022 for reconsideration.

‘Climate change is the biggest threat’

The delay has been decried by some environmentalists and scientists, who have been warning of the danger that climate change poses to the reef for years.

“Many of us were hoping for that decision to be made to draw even more international attention, both to the plight of the reef and to the Australian government’s failure to have decent climate policy,” says Lesley Hughes, a professor of biology at Sydney’s Macquarie University and a member of the Climate Council.

In early July, several top scientists wrote a letter to UNESCO supporting the decision to list the reef as “in danger” in part because Australia “has so far not pulled its weight” in the global effort to reduce carbon emissions.

The Australian government has faced criticism for dragging its feet on climate change—even as wildfires exacerbated by global warming scorched an area twice the size of Florida in apocalyptic blazes during late 2019 and early 2020.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has argued that Australia, which generates about 1.3% of global emissions, can’t do anything to solve the problem because Australia’s greenhouse-gas emissions make up only a small share of the global total.

But that ignores the fact that Australia is one of the world’s leading exporters of coal. Accounting for fossil fuel exports increases the country’s footprint to about 5% of global emissions, equivalent to the world’s fifth largest emitter, according to Climate Analytics, an advocacy group that tracks climate data.

A boat launches a sail in protest to the Adani Carmichael Coal Mine proposal in Airlie Beach, Australia on April 26, 2019. Lisa Maree Williams—Getty Images
A study released in 2020 by marine scientists at the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies in Queensland found that the Great Barrier Reef has lost more than 50% of its corals since 1995 as the result of warmer water driven by climate change.

It experienced three mass bleaching events in the last five years, leading to sharp declines in coral populations. (The bleaching phenomenon occurs when corals are stressed by changes in conditions.)

Fontes has spent the last 40 years guiding divers around the Great Barrier Reef and has seen the change first-hand. “Your favorite dive site—a part of it dies. You move to another dive site, and maybe some of that dies. That’s what’s been happening up and down the reef,” he says.

Hughes, of the Climate Council, says the government is making strides in things like improving water quality, but it is not addressing the most significant threat to the reef’s future. “Climate change is the biggest threat facing the reef,” she says, “and what the government is not doing is much to face or deal with that threat.”

Emma Camp, a marine biogeochemist at the University of Technology Sydney, is studying corals that might be able to survive in warmer, more acidic water. She says work like hers might buy the reef time while climate change is addressed, but collective action needs to be taken to reduce the world’s reliance on fossil fuels.

“The bottom line is that we fundamentally have to address carbon emissions to ensure a future for reefs,” says Camp, who was also one of TIME’s Next Generation’s Leaders in 2020.

With a report on its progress in protecting the reef due in February, it may only be a matter of time until Australia has to take greater action on climate change—that’s if it doesn’t want to see one of its most famed tourist spots placed on the danger list.

Fontes says that he hopes action is taken quickly to save the reef that’s played such an important role in his life.

“To me it’s still the most incredible reef on the planet, but it’s in serious trouble,” he says. “We need to take action now, while there’s still a reef to save.”

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(The Nation) The Media’s Climate Blind Spot Is Geographic

The Nation - Saleemul Huq | Mark Hertsgaard

When climate coverage ignores the Global South, it’s bad for everyone.

Waterlogged streets in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on June 21, 2021, after monsoon rains. (Mamunur Rashid / NurPhoto via Getty Images)

This story is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration cofounded by The Nation and Columbia Journalism Review to strengthen coverage of the climate emergency.
Climate change amounts to an undeclared, deeply unjust war against the global poor.

Though they have emitted almost none of the heat-trapping gases that have raised global temperatures to their highest levels in civilization’s history, it is the poor—especially in low-income countries in Asia, Africa, and South America—who suffer first and worst from overheating the planet.

For more than a decade, perilous, climate-driven events in wealthier nations have been preceded by counterparts in the Global South.

The deadly heat that has brutalized the American West—and rightly attracted headline news coverage—these past few weeks?

That kind of heat has been killing and immiserating people across the Sahel in Africa for many years—for example, in Burkina Faso, where, as one local journalist lamented with tears in his eyes, the suffering was especially heartbreaking among “the old, the old” people in his village.

The sea-level rise that is increasingly inundating Venice, despite the $6 billion spent on elaborate sea barriers meant to protect the city’s treasures?

Rising seas have been slashing rice yields in Bangladesh for a decade, as salty ocean water intrudes farther and farther inland onto the soil of the tabletop-flat delta of the Ganges and Brahmaputra rivers.

Recent scholarly studies and social media posts have suggested that this summer’s unprecedented heat and unfolding fire season might finally help more Americans acknowledge the realities of climate change.

Perhaps now, the thinking goes, more of them will realize that climate change is not only real and dangerous—it’s happening, right now, to them or people just like them. But those realities have been clear for some time:

The global poor have been living, and dying, from such climate-driven disasters for years—and with much less attention from the world media. A glaring example came last week when virtually every news outlet in the Global North ignored a landmark meeting where leaders of low-income countries articulated their positions prior to the make-or-break United Nations COP26 climate summit in November.

This V20 meeting—so named for the 20 countries that founded the Climate Vulnerable Forum in 2009—was hosted by Bangladesh in its capital city, Dhaka, on July 8.

Heads of government or finance ministers from 48 countries that are exceptionally vulnerable to climate change and inhabited by a combined 2 billion people attended the Dhaka summit in person or online. So did John Kerry, US President Joe Biden’s international climate envoy; António Guterres, the UN secretary-general; David Malpass, the president of the World Bank Group; and the heads of development banks in Asia and Africa.

The world media was nowhere to be seen.

V20 organizers made it as convenient as possible for European and American news organizations to cover the Dhaka event.

Online streaming provided real-time access to the proceedings, in a choice of languages: English, French, Spanish, or Arabic. Mindful of the time differences involved—Dhaka is five hours ahead of London, 10 hours ahead of New York—organizers even scheduled the event for late-night Bangladesh time: It was 10:30 pm local time when the opening session began.

Nevertheless, it appears that the only coverage by a Global North news outlet was a 750-word story by Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of the Thomson Reuters global news and information service. And, apparently, the only places that story was picked up were the websites of the Canadian Broadcasting Company and the tabloid Daily Mail in Britain.

It’s inconceivable that the world media would treat a G7 or G20 summit like this. When leaders of the world’s seven richest countries per capita met in June, broadcast networks and newspapers across the Global North provided daily coverage before, during, and after the summit. There was abundant coverage again last week when finance ministers of the world’s 20 richest countries announced a tax crackdown on multinational corporations.

The contrasting silence about the V20 summit reveals an inexcusable double standard on the part of Global North news organizations. The unmistakable, if unwitting, message is that some voices in the global climate discussion count much more than others.

Correcting this double standard is not merely a matter of fairness; it’s also about telling the climate story accurately and in full in the lead-up to the crucial COP26 summit.

Had newsrooms in the Global North tuned in, they would have seen that the V20 summit in fact made plenty of news. Prime Minister of Bangladesh Sheikh Hasina and other V20 heads of government reminded rich countries of their pledge under the Paris Agreement to limit temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius and to provide $100 billion a year in climate aid to poor countries. Secretary-General Guterres and the COP26 president, British MP Alok Sharma, reiterated the point.

More surprising, given the United States’ patchy history around these issues, Kerry also endorsed the idea, calling the $100 billion in annual aid “imperative.” V20 finance ministers also announced that each of their countries is creating a National Climate Prosperity Plan to boost resilience to climate impacts and reach net-zero emissions by 2050, while also building economic prosperity.

Bangladesh is leading the way with its Mujib Climate Prosperity Plan, named after the statesman regarded as “the father of Bangladesh.”

 But to achieve these goals, low-income countries need financial help—which rich countries have promised, but mostly failed to deliver, for years now. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development claims to have given $79 billion in 2018 (the last year with reliable data)—a claim that unfortunately was taken at face value in the Thomson Reuters Foundation article.

An analysis by the anti-poverty NGO Oxfam found that this figure is wildly inflated, based on dodgy definitions and accounting tricks; for example, 75 percent of the aid was given as loans, not grants. A more accurate figure, Oxfam concluded, is $20 billion a year.

This aid shortfall carries profound implications, not only for the global poor but also for the rich’s own prospects of survival. One of every four people on Earth lives in the 48 countries in the Climate Vulnerable Forum.

If those countries lack the means to choose a green- over a brown-energy future, there is zero hope of limiting temperature rise to 1.5 C. In that event, the rich, as well as the poor, will suffer, as the current heat and fire in the American West—which are occurring after “only” 1.1 C of temperature rise—painfully demonstrate.

All this amounts to news that could hardly be more urgent for people to hear, wherever they happen to live on this planet. It’s past time the world media treated it that way.
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(AU The Guardian) US, European And UK Diplomats Meet To Encourage Australia To Ramp Up Climate Action

The Guardian - 

Exclusive: Diplomats have had multiple meetings in Canberra to discuss ways to engage with Australia on setting stronger climate targets

A group of ‘like-minded’ diplomats are hoping Australia will adopt more ambitious climate commitments. Photograph: David Gray/Getty Images/500px Prime

European, British and American diplomats have met up to three times in Canberra over recent months to discuss how to encourage Australia to consider stronger cuts to its greenhouse gas emissions.

Guardian Australia can reveal diplomats from like-minded countries have been talking about how they could engage in dialogue with Australia, aimed at lifting its level of climate ambition ahead of a crucial international conference in November.

In addition to pursuing engagement with the Australian government, possible options include outreach to business associations and farming groups.

The most recent meeting, held on Thursday last week, brought together the ambassadors, high commissioners or deputy heads of mission of the UK, the US, the European Union, Denmark, France, Italy, Germany, Canada, Sweden and Switzerland.

The talks come as the Morrison government faces growing calls, both within Australia and internationally, to formally commit to net zero by 2050 and to strengthen its 2030 target, which remains at the Abbott government-era level of a 26-28% cut in emissions compared with 2005.

Diplomatic sources in Canberra described the meetings as “networking and outreach events” among like-minded countries.

One source said the participants were looking for ways to “nudge” Australia towards strengthening its pledges, including the medium-term target, given the coming decade is considered vital to keeping within reach the Paris goal of limiting heating to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels.

But another source familiar with the talks said they were aimed at fostering dialogue with Australia.

The meetings have been organised by the UK, which as the host of Cop26 in Glasgow in November is seeking to rally all countries to strengthen their commitments.

The British high commissioner, Vicki Treadell, tweeted on Friday night in vague terms about the latest meeting, saying it was “a pleasure to gather likeminded colleagues to compare notes” on climate action – but until now the focus of the talks has not been reported. When approached for comment about the Canberra meetings, a spokesperson for the UK government said: “As president of Cop26 … the UK continues to work with all parties on our shared ambition for Cop in less than 100 days.

“Accelerating collaboration is a key Cop26 goal and ensuring a successful outcome is our shared responsibility.”

The US – which under the Biden administration has vowed to weave the climate crisis into the fabric of all of its diplomatic engagements – is also understood to be playing an active role in the talks.

A spokesperson for the US embassy said: “We regularly meet with our Australian and diplomatic contacts on our shared ambition to address climate change.”

The US spokesperson added: “None of us can do this alone. Working together to develop and invest in green technologies will play a big role in tackling the climate crisis, as will setting new, more ambitious climate goals.”

A spokesperson for the EU said it “participates in regular discussions with many stakeholders about the need for all nations to take more ambitious climate action”.

The prime minister, Scott Morrison, has repeatedly said his government wants to achieve net zero emissions as soon as possible, and preferably by 2050 – but to date has stopped short of making a firm commitment. He faces pushback from his junior Coalition parter, the Nationals.

“Well, we are working on a plan as to how that [net zero] could be achieved, because in Australia, people like to know what it will cost and how you’re going to get there,” Morrison told Triple J’s Hack program last week.

The Australian government has repeatedly promoted a “technology not taxes” approach to climate policy. On the sidelines of the G7 summit in Cornwall last month, Morrison inked deals with Japan and Germany to develop technology to help reach “a net zero emissions future”.

But the Biden administration has previously expressed public concerns about the trajectory of Australia’s emission reduction pledges and implied that technological development, while important, was insufficient on its own.

Mike Goldman, the chargé d’affaires at the US embassy, has indicated both Australia and the US needed to set “more ambitious climate goals”.

In February Joe Biden’s climate envoy, John Kerry, publicly acknowledged past “differences” between the US and Australia in tackling the climate crisis while calling for a faster exit from coal-fired power.

Earlier this week the UK’s president-designate of the Cop26 summit, Alok Sharma, expressed disappointment that a two-day meeting in London had failed to secure agreement from every country to phase out coal-fired power.

Ministers from more than 50 countries agreed to limit global heating to 1.5C, but Sharma said: “Unless we get all countries signed up to a coal phase-out, keeping 1.5C in reach is going to be extremely difficult.”

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