By Darilyn Luco, delegate of Samoa

The world is warming faster than at any time in the last 10,000 years. As global warming tightens its grip,

its effects are being felt from the highest mountain peaks, to deep in the oceans, and from the Equator to the poles…

As each of us release more and more carbon into the atmosphere, we make the ozone layer thinner and thinner. Some parts of the ozone layer already have holes in them. The thinner the ozone, the hotter it gets since the ozone layer is what protects us from the sun’s harmful rays. This is causing us all great problems, all over the world. From the polar ice caps that are melting because of it to the coral reefs that are dying.

With the temperature rising very steadily Samoa is steadily sinking because of the ever-rising waters that come with global warming. The water rises mostly because in the heat the ocean expands and begins to occupy a larger area. The most obvious negative effect of this is that Samoa will have to rebuild the whole coast. Yet, Samoa won’t just have to rebuild the coast but will have to think about new anti-flood facilities such as coastal walls and drainages as a precaution and build them. Less and less people want to live near the coast so we also have to rethink our urban areas to accommodate more people.

Global warming also brings a lot more disease and heat-related deaths. The people most at risk are our elderly, infants and people with cardiovascular/respiratory diseases. Vector-borne diseases such as malaria and dengue fever will become much more common, contagious and they will strengthen as the temperature rises. Global warming could result in a 50-800 million rise in cases of malaria each year.

Pollution and air quality will also be affected by the rising global climate. Pollution will become much higher in later years mostly due to the warming weather. Just think about how much more air-cons will be used and more things will have to be indoor. This will also contribute to disease and sickness.

Another major change is the economic drop that global warming will bring. Obviously, more money will have to be budgeted so that we can put more money into the construction of our new coast, more inland housing, medical (doctors, hospital, medicine), putting less carbon into the atmosphere and repairing damage from the severe weather storms that the hot global warming will also bring.

One other change is that we will all experience a huge food shortage. There are many reasons for this but they are all brought on by the warmth. Everyone will suffer from this but the smaller nations like Samoa will be affected most. We will have less land to grow crops and our crops will grow worse and worse in the immense heat.

Global warming has already killed off its first species! Although the Golden Toad was not living in Samoa, other species will die off and already are. One of the most drastic are the coral reefs. Slowly, they are already shrinking and dying off. Our coastal shores will never be the same without the coral reefs. With the coral reefs gone, millions of other sea creatures will die off, as they depend on the corals for food, home and reproduction.

Its not only animals that will suffer, but their homes as well. Forests are highly sensitive to climate change, and up to one third of Samoa’s forests will be affected in some way.

One more effect on Samoa’s environment will be the rise in severe storms and flooding. As the climate is rising we have already been experiencing more drastic and damaging storms and so have our neighbours. So far, the biggest and deadliest storm in the western hemisphere was Hurricane Mitch in 1998, which killed 11,000 and left 3,000,000 homeless.

Believe it or not but the blame lies on us. Western countries are most to blame, but everyone has contributed. Think about that every time you turn on the TV or flag a taxi. An average European car (they are everywhere) has a fuel consumption of around 7.8litres/1000 km, travels 16,000 km per year, emits almost 3 tonnes (6500 lbs) of CO2

each year.

Federal policies should be enforced that limit emissions from power plants, increase fuel efficiency of transportation, provide incentives to businesses to cut emissions and increase the federal investment in developing clean-energy technology and putting them into the market.

Technology to reduce CO2 emissions and solve global warming are already with us. They work well and are cost-efficient. It really starts with simple things such as double-glazing windows, better insulated buildings, energy-saving lighting and household appliances and televisions with consume no power during their standby status. Cars which use a fraction of the fuel used today. These will all help immensely since less energy means less pollution. We either cut down on our CO2 emissions or we use renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power. These produce no global pollution at all.

Letting the world’s thermometer cool will predictable take a 70% reduction in our level of carbon emissions. Think about how many things we use everyday, every hour let carbons out into the air. A basic plan on how we would cut down on our carbon emissions;

•Redirect $300,000,000,000 that the world is currently spending on subsidies for fossil fuels to renewable power (solar systems, wind farms, geothermal, fuel cells)

• Make every country, developed or not, commit to specific reductions in carbon emissions every year (5%)

• Fund renewable-energy projects in the developing world through a tax on international currency speculation. This could raise $300 billion a year to help other nations avoid the industrial world’s mistakes.