BY WISDOM MUDZUNGAIRI
It is now acknowledged that Zimbabwe cannot achieve its
development targets unless there are appropriate investments in agriculture,
environment and natural resources management. Covering two-thirds of the country,
agriculture can make a significant contribution to national development. But,
failure to integrate climate change into the national economy is perhaps the
main reason for the failure of national development since independence.
Investing in agriculture is now a constitutional imperative
that is binding on the government. The institutional foundations for
integrating agriculture into national development are also now in place. What
remains to be overcome are the persistent negative narratives about climate
change vis-à-vis agriculture that has traditionally held back development, and
for all concerned actors to translate the policy reforms into actual benefits
for the sector and the country.
So when Environment and Natural Resources Management
minister Francis Nhema said Zimbabweans needed a shift of mind-set to put more
value to the environment by avoiding veld fires, land degradation and bad
mining practices, he was right.
Without an iota of doubt, human action has greatly
contributed to the climate change phenomenon that has resulted in natural
disasters such as droughts and floods.
Many people are suffering due to environmental problems,
mainly caused by humans. Therefore, it is time all Zimbabweans should adopt
strategies that scrap insignificant weather events. These policies and
programmes, if implemented quickly and at multiple scales, could help avert
environmental stresses.
To effectively curb environmental problems, these policies
and programmes must take into account existing social, political and economic
tensions and avoid exacerbating them.
For instance, Nhema said adaptation projects such as
conservation agriculture and water harvesting should be taken seriously if the
country was to fight the extreme weather events being experienced.
Stopping climate change only requires the commitment of all,
otherwise we will have runaway climate change whose consequences are colossal.
But what is runaway climate change? Dear reader, it is a theory of how things
might go badly wrong for the planet if a relatively small warming of the earth
upsets the normal checks and balances that keep the climate in equilibrium. As
the atmosphere heats up, more greenhouse gases are released from the soil and
seas. Plants and trees that take carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere die back,
creating a vicious circle as the climate gets hotter and hotter.
The phrase “tipping point” is heard a lot more from
scientists. Once the temperature rises a certain amount, then all the ice caps
will melt. The tipping point in many scientists’ view is the 2˚C rise that
countries have adopted as the maximum limit that mankind can risk.
Beyond that, as unwelcome changes in the earth’s reaction to
extra warmth continue, it is theoretically possible to trigger runaway climate
change, making the earth’s atmosphere so different that most of life would be
threatened.
As with a lot of climate science, what used to be theory is
now being seen in practice on the ground. New information makes clear that
reaching the tipping point is a much more immediate threat than was previously
thought.
Hence the key question is: How close are we to a 2˚C rise,
and when will we get there? The first thing to admit is that nobody knows for
sure, but many who understand the science say the answer to this twin question
is, first, that we are already very close, and, second, we might get there
terrifyingly soon. In fact, the 2˚C threshold is much closer than almost anyone
outside the specialist scientific community is prepared to acknowledge.
By any standard, if we care about the future of the human
race, it is too close for comfort. So to the vital question of when we might
reach 2˚C above pre-industrial levels; in other words, how much time do we have
to curb our excess emissions? Warming is directly related to the quantities of
greenhouse gases there are in the air, the chief of which is carbon dioxide.
On this evidence it is clear that drastic action is needed.
Countries such as Zimbabwe and many others need to have clear climate change
policies that can be understood by the people and supported by government
structures.
Having attended five United Nations Framework Convention on
Climate Change (UNFCCC) consecutive conferences in the last few years, I have
discovered that recent evidence demands that we need to cut existing emissions
by between 60% and 80% in the next 40 years to stand a chance of preventing
climate change becoming unstoppable, and keeping control of our own destiny.
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