Havana (EFE).- The United Nations warned the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean that for at least the next four decades there will be more and more heat waves, floods, droughts and hurricanes, and urged the governments region to establish early warning systems.
Petteri Taalas, Secretary General of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), a UN agency, made this warning in an interview with EFE in the framework of the XIV International Convention on Environment and Development that is being held this week in Havana.
“We have to adapt to climate change, because this negative trend in weather patterns is going to continue into the 1960s no matter what we do, which means we’re going to see more heat waves, we’re going to see more floods, droughts, and major hurricanes. intensity,” Taalas said.
The need to adapt
Among these adaptation measures, it is worth noting that early warning systems must be established in all the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, because currently “only a fraction” of the nations in this region have appropriate technology in this area.
According to the WMO, he added, these systems must serve to detect “multiple hazards,” including “meteorological, hydrological, geophysical, and oceanic risks,” but they must also anticipate the impact of these phenomena on “agriculture, public safety, transportation, public health and the energy sector”.
Here, he added that some countries need better meteorological measurement systems, an area in which industrialized economies, with more current technology, could help.
“We have to improve the situation in this region, especially in the Caribbean countries,” added Taalas, who stressed that the most vulnerable countries are the Caribbean island states -due to tropical storms and sea level rise- and Brazil, on the issue of deforestation.
Latin America is no stranger to world records
The WMO Secretary General stated that it is “almost certain” that the global temperature record will be broken in the next five years, adding that daily historical records have already been set recently.
According to Taalas, scientific studies indicate that there is a 66% probability that in the next five years the limit of 1.5 degrees Celsius of temperature rise will be exceeded in a timely manner with respect to pre-industrial levels, one of the limits set by the Paris Agreement against global warming.
“There has been an acceleration of climate change” in Latin America and the Caribbean, affirmed the Secretary General of the WMO, who warned of the “growing impacts” of global warming, which bring human and economic losses.
Regarding mitigation of the effects of the climate crisis, Taalas advocated “stop using fossil fuels” and, in this part of the world especially, “stop deforesting the Amazon”, two problems that raise CO2 in the atmosphere, a of the main causes of global warming.
A “vicious circle” of the climate crisis
Taalas presented the third annual WMO report on the state of the climate in Latin America and the Caribbean at the Havana convention, which ensures that droughts, cyclones, melting glaciers and forest fires are increasingly serious in the region.
The WMO indicates that this is creating a “vicious circle” that accelerates global warming in a particularly vulnerable area and called on the governments of the region to take measures so that “early warning systems are stronger and reach the communities that they need them most.”
The report reveals that last year there were “78 meteorological, hydrological and climatic hazards”, mainly storms and floods, but also hurricanes, droughts and forest fires that left at least 1,153 documented fatalities and economic damage worth at least 9,000 million of dollars.
The document highlights the damage caused in 2022 by hurricanes Iona, Lisa and Ian, the rains in the city of Petropolis (with 230 deaths), the drought in the Paraná-Plata basin (the worst since 1944), the mega-drought of 14 years in Chile and forest fires in Argentina, Paraguay, Bolivia and Chile (with the CO2 emissions they entail).