Has Climate Change Affected Your Life? Or the Life of Someone You Know?
September 2, 2008—Climate change will alter our landscapes and affect how and where we live.
Film Contest: Climate Change and People's Lives
Poor people in developing countries are already more affected by natural disasters. Climate change will only make this worse.
Some of these changes are already happening. An Indonesian fisherman may go days without catching any fish. A farmer in Niger struggles to work her land despite diminishing rainfall.
Other changes will be more subtle; their nature and extent are not yet fully understood.
Recently, the World Bank organized an international workshop to discuss the possible social dimensions of climate change, which might encompass conflict, migration, urban space, rural institutions, drylands, indigenous people and gender.
As Steen Jorgensen, World Bank director of the social development department said at the workshop, "The impacts of climate change are seen and felt differently by different people, depending on, for example, their gender, age, caste, or ethnic group."
Even just a 2°C increase in temperature in coming decades could worsen drought and flooding and plunge hundreds of millions of people into hunger. It would expose millions more people to malaria and water shortages, according to experts. This in turn could potentially drive more conflicts, forcing millions of people to flee.
A UNDP report released in August also focuses on the 2° C temperature rise. The report, Two Degrees of Separation Between Hope and Despair, looks at climate change from the perspective of young people—how they view climate change and what they believe are the best means for tackling it.
The report was produced wholly by young people and is peppered with first-hand observations. For example, Nazif Shuva recounts his visit to Faridpur in Bangladesh. The village highly affected by climatic events, but villagers are unaware of climate change, believing instead that recent changes are just part of the natural cycle. Nazif concludes that better education and more effective environmental laws are essential.
What about you? How do you see climate change affecting people’s lives? Have you experienced its effects yourself? Have you seen how it has affected other people? Can you document those effects in a mini-documentary?
The World Bank has launched a video contest on climate change and development. Submit your film by Friday, October 24, 2008! Get more information from the contest’s website!
Or if you prefer to contact Youthink! about it, send us an email or fill out the form in the right bar on this page.
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