Fragilecologies Archives
7 July 2006
There are lots of climate-related publications coming out of sub-Saharan Africa these days. Many of them are about the science and impacts of climate, water and weather extremes. In fact, there has been a significant increase in the amount of coverage on climate-related issues for that continent during the past few decades. Episodes of drought aside, in the early post-independence period (starting in either the 1950s or 1960s depending on the particular country being liberated), news about African development prospects alluded to positive (that is, hopeful) trends in the development paths that Africa’s first set of leaders of independence movements were likely to follow. In other words, hopes were very high for economic and political development throughout the continent.
The information coming out about Africa these days, in general, paints a picture of gloom and doom: wars, invasions of neighboring countries, ethnic rivalries, occupation forces, genocides, warlords, mercenaries, corruption, dictators, food shortages, child soldiers, unspeakable crimes against humanity, refugee camps under military attack, coastal pirates and environmental transformation of all kinds of ecosystems (e.g., cutting down trees in order to open new lands for agriculture) which often turn out to be environmental changes for the worse.
Africans and Global Warming
Despite this rather bleak picture of Africa that has been painted by the media as well as by reality, sub-Saharan Africa does have an emerging bright spot. Thanks to the process of “capacity building”, climate literacy in Africa has improved in the area of understanding of and concern about global warming of the Earth’s atmosphere and its likely impacts on many aspects of the continent’s ecosystems and human well-being.
For well over a decade African researchers and government agents have been immersed in issues, conferences and research activities about the interactions among climate, society and the environment, with special attention given to global warming by multilateral and bilateral funding agencies.
The good news out of Africa is that many African researchers in various disciplines are now well aware of the science of global warming, the ecological impacts of global warming, the politics involved (both national and international), the costs of action as opposed to inaction, foreseeable societal and economic impacts, and the ethical and equity issues that pervade both the causes and consequences of, and responses to, global warming. In fact, one could contend that, with regard to global warming, human capacity (individual and institutional) is increasingly being built on the African continent. At the very least, a threshold has been crossed, suggesting that this interest in climate issues of variability, change and extremes can only continue to grow stronger and more widespread, if provided with the moral as well as the financial support to do so.
However, what I think is lacking is the untethered funding that is needed for Africans to develop their own path of research planning and follow-through on climate, water and weather activities — not only for global warming but for seasonal, interannual and decadal variability and extremes. No doubt, there is very strong interest to improve food security throughout sub-Saharan Africa . Any steps that can move toward improving food security today would most likely serve as a major step toward coping with the yet-unknown consequences for water resources and food production of climate change impacts on water and food across the continent.
In sum, human capacity on climate issues (i.e., capabilities to carry out climate and climate-related research) exists in sub-Saharan Africa . What is needed now, and urgently, are financial resources so they can develop their own climate-related agenda.
What is the situation across the Atlantic Ocean for African-Americans in the USA ?
African Americans and Global Warming
The African American community in the United States presents a different picture than that for Africans. For whatever reason, it appears that, with some exceptions, the African-American community has not been deeply involved in the global warming issue, especially in the part of the issue that I am concerned about, the societal impacts. A key exception was carried out by Environmental Justice Professor Robert Bullard, Clark Atlantic University ( Atlanta , Georgia ), in November 2000 in The Netherlands. He organized an International conference on “Climate and People of Color”.
He noted on his website [http://www.ejrc.cau.edu/climatechgpoc.html] that
Numerous studies document that the poor and people of color in the United States and around the world have borne greater health and environmental risks than the society at large when it comes to workplace hazards, pollution from chemical plants, municipal landfills, incinerators, abandoned toxic waste dumps, lead smelters, and emissions from clogged freeways. The environmental and economic justice movement was born in response to these injustices and disparities. The movement’s diverse allies have much to offer policymakers in resolving many of the problems that have resulted from industrial pollution and human settlement patterns.
Finding solutions to global climate change is one of the areas that desperately need the input from those populations most likely to be negatively affected, poor people in the developing countries of the South and people of color and the poor in the North. Global climate change looms as a major environmental justice issue of the 21st century.
Another recent expression of interest in climate’s impacts on the minorities focused specifically on the United States . The US Congressional Black Caucus, a group that includes all African-American members of the US Congress, commissioned a report
that focused on the potential impacts of global warming on African Americans. The report (entitled “Black Americans and Global Warming: An Unequal Burden”) was released to the public in July 2004. The report supported Bullard’s (among others’) contention that minorities (in America , African Americans specifically) are most likely to suffer disproportionately as a result of the foreseeable impacts of climate change (for example, flooding, heat waves and high energy prices).
Most likely, they already are suffering disproportionately from the impacts of today’s climate variability and extreme events, such as Hurricane Katrina’s impacts in New Orleans in 2005 and Hurricane Floyd’s impacts in North Carolina in 1999. To be sure, all poor people along with people in other socio-economic strata in these areas, regardless of race, were adversely affected by these events. However, the African-American communities have been the worst affected with regard to adverse impacts (deaths) and in the economic recovery process as well, when compared with other nearby communities and socioeconomic groups.
The report of the Caucus seemed to dwell primarily on energy-related issues, especially the impacts of the rising costs to Black consumers of energy (heat, light, gasoline, for example). However, there are many more obvious and subtle climate-related impacts that can adversely affect Black Americans. Some of those adverse impacts were exposed on TV and in newspapers worldwide as Hurricane Katrina made landfall along the US Gulf Coast on August 29, 2005.
Poor people, many of whom were African-Americans, were the primary victims of Katrina. They were living in areas known to be most vulnerable to flooding, as much of New Orleans had been built below sea level and protected by levees from invasion of waters from the Gulf of Mexico and Lake Ponchetrain. Making a risky situation even riskier, poorer people in New Orleans were also the least likely to have life or property insurance coverage on their lives and property, transportation or cash in hand for a rapid escape from the potential threats from Hurricane Katrina.
A brief comparison of two parts of the city, one predominantly Black and the other White, underscores the demographic differences and disadvantages between these communities: the Lower Ninth Ward (African American) and the Lake District (Caucasian).
While reflecting on the discriminatory impacts of Katrina and how it exposed the vulnerabilities of African-American minority residents, I was reminded about the devastating impacts of Hurricane Floyd (September 1999) which, today, few remember. It damaged greatly a predominantly African American town called Princeville, as well as nearby communities. In the first year or two after having been hit by Hurricane Floyd, Princeville still struggled to get support to rebuild itself, whereas other adversely affected communities seemed to have been on the mend at a much faster pace.
In 2004 (a year before Katrina), I sought to encourage the development of a “Climate Affairs” program for undergraduates at the Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs). This was (and still is) an attempt to develop awareness of and interest among African-Americans (i.e., to build capacity) in climate-related science, impacts and equity issues. This can empower the African-American community to better cope with the obvious and not so obvious ways that climate variability, change and extremes can influence human activities in general and their communities in particular.
Keeping Bullard’s earlier statement in mind,
Finding solutions to global climate change is one of the areas that desperately need the input from those populations most likely to be negatively affected, poor people in the developing countries of the South and people of color and the poor in the North.
there are not many African-Americans focused on climate-related impacts. At least, I have not encountered many over the years at various climate-related meetings I have attended.
There are some African-American scientists researching the science of climate change, and there are many Africans who have come to the USA to teach science at the university level.
The main point of a comparison of Africans and African Americans focused on climate impact assessments is to underscore what I believe is an urgent need to sharply and quickly increase the involvement in climate-related impact assessments of African-Americans, the minority most likely to be adversely affected by global warming. Only by getting involved directly in climate impact studies related to climate change — whether public health, disaster preparedness, political and legal aspects, risk assessments, and so on — will African Americans be prepared to do their own bidding in political circles, for the greater protection of the African-American community, not only from global warming but from other climate and weather extremes as well, such as hurricanes, floods, vector-borne diseases (e.g., mosquitoes), and other climate-related problems.
As an observer of several decades of climate and climate-related research activities, I believe this is a neglected area of concern that warrants greater recognition by African Americans as well as by those who fund education and training programs. An African-American research community would benefit greatly by building individual and institutional capacity with regard to designing and fostering reliable and sustainable coping mechanisms of disadvantaged or marginalized minority groups. This is an area of research and research application where African climate-related impacts researchers can help to build climate-related capacity among African Americans.