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Miliband says climate change will bring food and water shortgages
22 Oct 2009Foreign Secretary David Miliband today warned of a "high pressure" future of water and food shortages, mass migration and conflict if the world fails to tackle the problem of climate change.
Mr Miliband was speaking as he and his brother Ed, the Climate Change Secretary, unveiled a map showing the kind of damage global warming would wreak if average world temperatures should rise by 4C.
The map shows impacts including temperatures rising by up to 15C in the Arctic, sea level rises and storm surges hitting the east coast of Britain, an increased risk of forest fires and droughts in Europe and falls in maize and wheat production by as much as 40% in south east Asia and Africa.
The ministers, speaking at the launch of a Science Museum exhibition setting out evidence for the need for action, warned of the importance of securing a new global agreement at Copenhagen in December to cut greenhouse gas emissions which cause climate change.
The Foreign Secretary said climate change was not just an environmental issue, but a "human emergency" which would affect economics, culture, technology and foreign policy.
He warned of dangers of water shortages, drought and desertification which would reduce the available food for a rising population, increased migration with a further 200 million people on the move and increases in conflict as people fight for scarcer resources - such as water in the Middle East.
He said: "The reason for publishing this map is that for many people, not only in our own country but around the world, the penny hasn't yet dropped that this climate change challenge is real, it's happening now."
He said the effects of climate change were not in "some far flung future" but would be affecting hundreds of millions of people within his lifetime - and that 4C rises could happen in his children's lifetime.
And he said: "The penny hasn't dropped that Copenhagen is the chance to address - on a global scale - the challenge."
Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband said while the "nightmare" of dangerous climate change would cause terrible problems, a global deal to stop the inexorable rise of greenhouse gas emissions was achievable.
He acknowledged it was a "tough ask" but said the looming deadline of the United Nations talks in Copenhagen was concentrating the minds of world leaders and negotiators on tackling the problem.
He said securing a new agreement to cut emissions would unleash trillions of dollars of economic opportunity through stimulating the development of low-carbon technology such as wind power.
"A deal in Copenhagen would not just be good for our environment, it will be good for our economy as well and for our energy security," he said.
The Prove It exhibition at the Science Museum, London, aims to lay out the evidence for man-made climate change, drawing on information from a number of top UK bodies including the Met Office Hadley Centre, the London School of Economics and the Overseas Development Institute.
The exhibition includes a tonne of coal, marking the fact that the amount of fossil fuels burnt by humans passed the half trillion tonne mark last year, and if humans are to avoid dangerous climate change they must never burn the trillionth tonne.
If Copenhagen succeeds, the museum will hold on to the "trillionth" tonne in perpetuity, but if it fails and the CO2 from a trillion tonnes is put into the atmosphere at some point in the future, the tonne will be then burnt.
The museum's director, Professor Chris Rapley, said: "The Science Museum believes that current climate change is real, driven by humans, and potentially threatening - to our food and water supplies, to our health and to world security.
"We base this on the scientific evidence."
Dr Vicky Carroll, the exhibition's project leader, said the display included information about the science of climate change and the Copenhagen negotiations from a number of perspectives, including a climate scientist, a UK politician, a UN climate negotiator and a human rights expert.
She said: "We thought it was important for visitors to understand the whole picture. It's a scientific issue and science and technology will be really important in finding the solution, but that needs to be understood within a broader context.
"There's so much information about climate change but many people are still confused, so this gives them the evidence in a clear and accessible way."
Science Museum chairman Lord Waldegrave said the museum had decided to join the debate on climate change, which he described as a "mad experiment to be doing with the future of the planet".
"We're not campaigning, but we have come down on one side of this argument," he said, adding the neighbouring Natural History Museum was not neutral on the issue of evolution and the Science Museum was not neutral on global warming.
Reader views (8)
I suggest that David Miliband reads Eirik's Saga and Graelendinga Saga. He will then learn that over 1200 years ago when these Vikings colonised Greenland they had cattle in the MEADOWS at Brattalid on the southwest coast.
No doubt that particular period of global warming was caused by the Diesel engine pollution from their longships!
It's a natural phenomenum you muppet!!
- Anil Chatterjee, Manchester, 22/10/2009 19:49
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Instead of these so called experts on Global Warming like Milliband talking about something they know absolutely nothing, I suggest they read a book called 'The Sun, A Biography'.
They will learn all about global warming that has taken place over millions of years and stop trying to convince us that we are all stupid and can't make our own minds up. On the question of food and water shortages, there are millions of acres of land available to grow food, especially in Africa, but the inhabitants are too busy killing each other to be bothered about growing food because it means work. Its much easier to beg off other people. According to other experts, the babies born today are going to live to be a hundred years old, but how can they when there is not going to be enough food and water. My definition of an expert is someone who knows more and more about less and less. I wouldn't trust them to take my dog for a walk.
- Gordon, Macclesfield, UK, 22/10/2009 19:09
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Plonkers. They fly around the world in privately chartered jets and tell the rest of us to switch the tv off. Do they take us for fools? (well we know the answer to that!)
- John Bell, Nottm, UK, 22/10/2009 18:01
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And how much tax would you like me to donate in order to fix this problem, Dave?
- Nobby Clark, Perth, the Scottish one, 22/10/2009 16:21
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Let Miliband and all other Cabinet ministers and MPs volunteer to have their carbon footprint assessed by an independent body and published online for all to see. Show some leadership, openness and honesty and let's find out how many of you are hypocrites. And don't forget bliar.
- Ralph, London, 22/10/2009 14:35
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Well said David. Now back it up with a ban on UK airport expansion.
- Austen, London, 22/10/2009 13:46
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So will mass uncontrolled immigration + baby boom bring food and water shortages. Has anyone thought of that ?????
- Grim Reaper, Hell, 22/10/2009 13:35
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I have never read such unmitigated codswallop in all my 70 years on this planet.
Milibanana needs to get a life.
The climate of the planet has been changing for thousands of years and will continue to do so - without the parasite Milibands attempting to frighten peeps in the UK.
- Reuben Camara, Morecambe Compound, EUSSR, 22/10/2009 13:31
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