...MENA ( Middle East and North Africa) (click here) is a valuable repository of traditional and institutional knowledge, which, if preserved and made accessible, could prove an important contribution, globally, to efforts to address climate change. These are gaining new momentum in the aftermath of the recent Bali conference of the parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. In addition to setting out a roadmap for a new international agreement on the reduction of Greenhouse Gas emissions, the conference launched a series of initiatives to help countries adapt to climate change, including the activation of an “Adaptation Fund” to be entrusted to the World Bank, with the Global Environment Facility (GEF) operating as Secretariat of the Fund.
The MNA Climate Change Experience
An increasing level of awareness is building among all stakeholders in the MENA region on the significance of climate change, reflecting both the global increase in awareness of the phenomenon, as well as mounting concerns in the region about increasingly frequent droughts and a looming water supply shortage. While ultimately, effective adaptation to climate change will depend on countries’ commitment, the Bank has a key role to play in mainstreaming adaptation measures in MENA’s development agenda....
Many (click here) are still asking is current global warming natural or human caused? The idea that global warming is natural is not an absurd question. In the natural cycle, global warming is natural. The better question is, 'is current global warming natural'? There are multiple lines of evidence that point us to the origin of our current warming:
...2.The isotopic signature clearly shows that the extra CO2 in the atmosphere is from fossil fuels.
3. We are no longer in the natural cycle. We have largely departed from the natural course of climate and there is no natural mechanism that explains it.
4. The models and the observations match....
By Coral Davenport
May 13, 2014
...In an interview, Secretary of State John Kerry signaled (click here) that the report’s findings would influence American foreign policy.
“Tribes are killing each other over water today,” Mr. Kerry said. “Think of what happens if you have massive dislocation, or the drying up of the waters of the Nile, of the major rivers in China and India. The intelligence community takes it seriously, and it’s translated into action.”
Mr. Kerry, who plans to deliver a major speech this summer on the links between climate change and national security, said his remarks would also be aimed at building political support for President Obama’s climate change agenda, including a new regulation to cut pollution from coal-fired power plants that the administration will introduce in June....
