Toward a "Climate-smart" World

The World Development Report 2010 themed “Development and Climate Change” recently released by the World Bank (WB) in Hanoi emphasised joint efforts to curb increasingly complex climate changes. This is a crucially important condition to build a climate-smart world.

 

The message of the World Development Report 2010 is the appeal for a joint effort to minimise carbon emission and mitigate impacts of climate change.

According to the WB, East Asian - Pacific countries are vulnerable to impacts of climate change but developing countries can mitigate carbon emissions in the process of poverty reduction if they get financial supports and techniques from developed countries. Developed nations alone will have to spend from US$75 billion to US$100 billion to tackle climate changes from now to 2050. The East Asia - Pacific region will suffer highest costs. Vietnam is one of countries with adverse impacts of climate change and higher seawater level will affect 40 million people.

 

Also according to the report, hunger eradication, poverty reduction and sustainable development will remain the top global priorities because up to 25 % of population in developing countries are living below the poverty line, 1 billion people lack clean water, 1.6 billion people have no access to electricity, 3 billion people do not have appropriate hygiene, 25 % of children in developing countries are malnourished.

 

In the National Goal Programme for Response to Climate Change initiated in 2008, Vietnam predicted that the sea water level will rise 1 m by 2100. Therefore, Vietnam is one of riskiest countries when the sea water rises.

 

The sea level is causing effects on many economic sectors. The estimated sea water level in 2100 could submerge 30,945 square kilometres if dykes and water drainage systems are not property reinforced. This area is equal to 9.3 % of the land area in Vietnam. This is a major threat to the Mekong Delta, Dong Nai river basin, Ho Chi Minh City, the Red River Delta and coastal area.

 

According to the “average emission scenario”, compared with 1990, the average temperature will increase by nearly 2 degrees Celsius in southern Vietnam and up to 2.8 degrees Celsius in the northern region in 2100. However, according to the “high emission scenario”, the average temperature may rise to 3.6 degrees Celsius in central coastal area. Thus, the minimum temperature will rise and the number of days with temperature of 25 degrees C or higher than will be greater.

According to Ms Victoria Kwakwa, Country Director of WB in Vietnam, [we] need to build a climate-smart world. Developing countries need financial supports wile developed ones need to add effort to find out more energy sources and clean technologies.

 

Ms Xiaodong Wang, an author of the report, a climate-smart world knows to link nations. To achieve this, countries need to act now and to determine that if they do not spend on mitigation, they must spend on adaptation to the climate change.

 

“In the future, the amount of carbon emissions will concentrate on developing nations, not developed ones as now, consumer industries will emit the largest amount of greenhouse effect gas, and energy efficiency is the most effective solution,” Ms Wang said.

 

Mr Alexander Lotsch, co-author of the report, said: To attain energy-using efficiency in the context of climate change, [we] need strong decisions, instead of trying to selecting optimal solutions.

 

For Vietnam, according to Mr Douglas Graham, a senior environmentalist at the WB, one of the works Vietnam needs to do is to reduce carbon emissions but it has not mentioned to apply low-carbon technologies in its economic strategies. Besides, Vietnam is still unsuccessful with intertwining adaptation to climate change with socioeconomic development plans.