Forum explores climate change in Tanzania

By Felister Peter 29th April 2010 

The impacts of global climate change in Tanzania are likely to be devastating as reports show that between 12 and 26 million people in the world will be displaced from coastal areas in the future.

This was said in Dar es Salaam yesterday by Jason Rubens from World Wildlife Fund (WWF) when presenting a report on Climate Change: Science, Issues and Effects at a climate talk conference organized by the British Council and BBC-World Service Trust.Rubens said that so far some of the coastal areas in Tanzania had already started to experience problems related to climate change, including areas along the Indian Ocean, Mafia and Pangani islands. He said about 200 million people were likely to face hunger due to reduced rainfall, adding that some parts of the country had already started to experience minimal rains compared to previous years. He mentioned the areas as including Mpanda, Tanga, Arusha and Lake Zone regions.

"The world will experience a drop in of global agriculture output. There will be water problems whereby between 1 and 2.8 billion people will face water shortage," he said. For her part, British High Commissioner to Tanzania Diane Corner said that one of their roles was to help Tanzania ensure that its development coped with climate change.

"We support the government of Tanzania to prepare for climate change negotiations in international forums and ensure that climate change issues are fully addressed in agriculture, water and forestry", said Corner. She said they supported government efforts in accessing new types of international finance linked to reductions in carbon emissions.

Presenting the findings of the report titled ‘Tanzania Talks Climate', Mercy Kimaro from the BBC-World Service Trust said most people were unfamiliar with the concepts of climate change and global warming. "Most of them believe that climate change refers to changes in weather and have little knowledge of its global context or the greenhouse effects", she said. She said despite increased environmental degradation and resource scarcity, yet the people could not link the scenes with climate change.