The UN input is that climate change is having a impact on natural disasters. This is one of the threats we face says a report to the UN Secretary General.
This is entirely logical. As the global temperature rises the amount of evaporation into the clouds goes up. This means that there is more rain. In Kofi Annan‘s retiring report to the 59th session of the UN General Assembly:
Environmental degradation has enhanced the destructive potential of natural disasters and in some cases hastened their occurrence.
Too many big words, but a valid point. The environment is degrading, and both the impact of natural disasters and their frequency is going up. That’s a UN follow up to the Millennium Summit.
Why is this important to Wings?
Once the seed of disaster response was sown, then we needed confirmations.
Well, to quote the UN report: The dramatic increase in major disasters witnessed in the last 50 years provides worrying evidence.
For Wings Like Eagles, this is confirming evidence. Not just worrying evidence. It confirms that there is a real need. And that need is rising.
Our own research in 2006 shows this too:
So the desire to build a better system for disaster response helicopters looks right. That ability helps deal with the number of disasters.
Is that the only UN input?
But most of us can’t connect with the number of disasters. We connect with people. And the UN input highlights that too… more than two billion people were affected by such disasters in the last decade, and in the same period the economic toll surpassed that of the previous four decades combined.
Here’s Wings Like Eagle’s our research:
Let’s not forget that the population has been increasing all that time. And the news media are faster and wider reaching. So we should not be surprised that reported numbers are increasing.
You might like to note the relative numbers of people affected by different world problems.
So, the world wide evidence is that natural disasters are 11 times the problem of major people movements (IDP). And they are 7 times the problem of HIV/AIDS.
Wings Like Eagles responding to worrying evidence
This website is about how we are responding to this evidence. We hope you find it informative.
Why not contact us to tell us how you are thinking, or fund out more?
The world is engaged with this problem. Why sit on the side lines? Wings Like Eagles believes that together we can make a difference.
Why not become a regular donor, so we can respond quickly to disasters?
We would like you to do more. We would like you to respond to this worrying evidence.
Or get in touch to volunteer to be a part of this?
0