How Africa Pays for Climate Change

Over the last year I've been noticing a trend in the focus of climate change visualizations. Instead of concentrating on how the climate is likely to change in the coming decades climate scientists have begun to focus more on how climate change is already impacting the Earth.Of course these impacts are being felt more keenly in many parts of the developing in world. In other words it is the countries who have historically been least responsible for contributing towards climate change who are now beginning to be adversely effected by global heating.

In Who Damages the Climate the Most and Who Bears the Consequences the German newspaper Tagesspiegel looks at the effects that climate change is already having on many African countries. The newspaper uses an interactive 3D globe to highlight some of the impacts of global heating already been seen in many countries, particularly in Africa.

Ten of the countries who will be worst hit by drought are in Africa. For example, right now in Kenya 2.4 million people are at risk of starvation as a result of a severe drought. When rain does come it often now comes all at once. For example while Kenya s experiencing extreme drought neighboring South Sudan has seen some of its worst flooding in the last 20 years. 

As you scroll through the Tagesspiegel article choropleth layers are added to the interactive globe to show the global risks from drought and from flooding. These choropleth layers clearly show the increased risks being faced by African countries compared to many countries in the so-called developed world. 

As you progress through the article the interactive globe is also used to show the CO2 consumption of individual countries. This helps to reveal that while Africa is beginning to see the worst effects of climate change it is is probably the continent which is contributing the least to its acceleration. For example a person in South Sudan on average causes 0.1 tons of CO2 emissions per year. In comparison the average American causes 14.2 tons of CO2 emissions each year. Once you look at the historical consumption of CO2 this inequality in the causation of climate change becomes even more glaringly obvious.

However despite being less responsible for climate change Africa will pay. According to the IPCC temperatures in many African countries will rise faster than the global average. Because the economies of many African countries rely on agriculture and tourism climate change is also likely to have a very severe impact on the economy of Africa. So not only is Africa beginning to be severely impacted by climate change it is also now being made even poorer by a crisis largely caused by the developed world.