The term ‘one in a (usually 100, but increasingly 200) year flood/drought/storm’ is often used in the media to contextualise the latest weather event. Australia’s recent flooding is the latest example.
But the reality now is that the expression is about as useful to the public as a typewriter is to a journalist.
That’s because of the speed and severity of the onset of climate change. Even though we’ve known about climate change for a long time – US President Lyndon Johnson told Congress in 1965 that “this generation has altered the composition of the atmosphere on a global scale through … a steady increase in carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels” – the nature of the climate crisis is that it is growing exponentially, so that what might have been a freak event just fifteen years ago, is now a regular occurrence.
It has been asked whether Australia’s floods - which Treasurer Wayne Swan is describing as the most costly natural disaster in the country’s history – are due to climate change.
It will always be impossible to prove a direct link between a particular event and climate change, just as it is impossible to say that smoking has killed a smoker (at least, until the autopsy).
But what we do know is that extreme weather-related events, such as Australia’s floods, and the flooding and heavy rain experienced in parts of New Zealand this last week, are becoming more and more common, which is entirely in line with the science community’s past predictions. We also know that the prevailing ‘business as usual’ approach is under serious threat, whether that be from drought, insurance claims, or storm or flood damage.
As a country that relies so heavily on income from agriculture, New Zealand’s economic future is at real risk from climate change, as acknowledged by agriculture minister David Carter, who in December described changes in rainfall patterns as “a clear demonstration of the effects of climate change”.
Fonterra’s farmer shareholders buy over a million tonnes of palm kernel a year, which is typically grown on what were rainforests in Malaysia and Indonesia. Those forests, and the peatlands they often stand on, store enormous quantities of greenhouse gases - or at least they do until they are bulldozed by the palm products industry.
This gives Fonterra’s bogus claims that palm kernel is needed for extra feed during drought a tragic irony. The answer to feed shortages is simply to de-industrialise, and to use locally-grown maize, the demand for which is falling as the dairy sector’s reliance on palm kernel grows.
De-industrialization also makes sense when you consider that KPMG reported last year that New Zealand is going to lose its low-cost competitiveness to up and coming agricultural producers like China inside five years. This means the local industry’s only hope is to go after high-value consumers, who will care deeply that the money they spend on their premium butter is not part-funding a global catastrophe.
Proactive, climate-friendly policies on the part of business and government will pay off later, in terms of maintaining a truly clean, green, and valuable brand, in terms of avoiding production losses to the weather, and by way of preserving life on our planet.
As we continue to put off real action with almost criminally negligent phrases like ‘fast followers,’ the frozen Arctic tundra is melting, releasing methane, a far more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, into the atmosphere. This is typical of the snowballing nature of anthropogenic climate change. Action was needed 45 years ago, when LBJ stood in front of Congress. All the delays since mean that the current urgency of the situation cannot be overstated.
TAKE ACTION: Sign our petition to support 40% by 2020 emission reduction targets, say no to new oil and coal and tell Fonterra to stop importing palm kernel!
- Simon Boxer is the seniour climate campaigner at Greenpeace New Zealand