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CLIMATE CHANGE
Coastal Mega-Cities in for a Bumpy Ride
By Srabani Roy
NEW YORK, Mar 28, 2007 (IPS) - About 643 million people, or one-tenth of the
world's population, who live in low lying coastal areas are at great risk
of oceans-related impacts of climate change, according to a global
research study to be released next month.
The study, by researchers at Columbia University's Centre for
International Earth Sciences Information Network and the London-based
International Institute for Environment and Development, is the first of
its kind. The researchers identified populations, particularly urban
populations, at greatest risk from rising sea levels and more intense
storms due to climate change.
"Of the more than 180 countries with populations in the low-elevation
coastal zone, 130 of them - about 70 percent - have their largest urban
area extending into that zone," said Bridget Andersen, a research
associate at CIESIN, in a statement.
"Furthermore, the world's largest cities - those with more than five
million residents - have on average one-fifth of their population and
one-sixth of their land area within this coastal zone."
The study, which will be published in the peer-reviewed journal
Environment and Urbanisation, assesses the risks to populations and urban
settlements along coastal areas that are less than 10 metres above sea
level, referred to as the low-elevation coastal zone, or LECZ. Although
globally this zone accounts for only two percent of the world's land area,
it contains 10 percent of the world's population and 13 percent of the
world's urban population, the study found.
The 10 countries with the largest number of people living in this
vulnerable, low-elevation zone, include in descending order: China, India,
Bangladesh, Vietnam, Indonesia, Japan, Egypt, the United States, Thailand
and the Philippines.
Cities such as Dhaka, Shanghai and Mumbai are some of the most susceptible
to coastal, climate-related hazards such as floods, storms and cyclones.
And the rapid urbanisation occurring in these cities - especially in
China, which has growing special economic zones along its coasts - will
continue to attract more and more people.
"On average, costal cities are growing 20 percent faster than any other
cities in the world and they have 10-15 percent higher densities than
other cities," Sharad Shankardass, spokesperson for the U.N.'s agency for
human settlements, UN-Habitat, told IPS. "Of the 20 mega-cities in the
world, 15 of them are coastal."
The study found that 75 percent of people living in the vulnerable
low-elevation zone and two-thirds of the world's urban population are in
Asia. In conjunction with the findings of the CIESIN-IIED study, 11 of the
15 coastal mega-cities listed by UN-Habitat in 2005 are in low-medium
income countries. The study found that 14 percent of the population of
least developed countries live in the LECZ, compared to only 10 percent in
wealthier countries.
Twenty-one percent of the urban populations in least developed countries
live in this zone. In richer countries belonging to the Organisation for
Economic Cooperation and Development, this number drops to 11 percent.
Human settlements in lower income countries with limited resources are,
therefore, significantly more vulnerable to climate-related hazards.
"It is very clear in my mind that poor countries will have a
disproportionate burden," Deborah Balk, a project investigator and
co-author of the study, told IPS, "particularly those with large deltaic
regions."
In fact, of the top 10 countries, Bangladesh, Egypt and Vietnam have a
large proportion of their populations living within the LECZ: 46, 38 and
55 percent respectively. The Bahamas, the Netherlands, and Suriname have
well over 70 percent of their populations living in the LECZ.
The study was partially funded by the Swedish International Development
Corporation Agency and the Danish International Development Agency, both
of which have programmes in urban environmental issues. Researchers
overlaid geographic data, the most recently available census data, and
information on urban settlements, to produce maps showing the populations
and land area in the LECZ for 244 countries. The information was then
summarised by country, region and income category.
The study makes it clear that sea levels are not expected to rise anywhere
near the 10 metres of the low-elevation zone. The fourth Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change report estimated that sea levels are likely to
rise in the range of 22-34 centimetres between 1990 and the 2080s. This
level could be significantly higher with accelerated melting of the
Greenland and polar ice sheets, the study noted.
Although small island states have the largest share of land in the
low-elevation zone (16 percent), and would, therefore, be most likely to
be affected by sea-related hazards, they tend to have less of their
population living in the zone. Balk attributed this to the fact that
people living on such islands are more adapted to coastal hazards and tend
to live further inland.
"The study demonstrates how critical an issue this is from a global
perspective - it is certainly not just one for small island states,"
Gordon McGranahan, head of the human settlements group at IIED and
co-author on the study, told IPS.
According to Tanya Imola, spokesperson for the international association
of local governments, ICLEI, many cities have started implementing
environmental programmes to address climate change and to curb their
overall carbon footprint. Initiatives include improvements to public
transportation, recycling programmes and energy efficiency. But only a few
cities have started thinking about how to address the effects of sea level
rise and other ocean-related hazards.
The authors of the CIESIN-IIED study categorise three types of responses
to address these risks: migration, mitigation and modification. Both
McGranahan and Balk agreed that these strategies have a long lead time.
UN-Habitat and the U.N. Environment Programme have initiated joint
projects to address these issues, but UN-Habitat's Shankardass pointed out
that "we are still in the early stages of establishing a realistic
strategy for intervention and implementation for cities that will be
directly affected by climate change."
Of utmost importance, McGranahan noted, is to start working with national
and local authorities engaged in urban and environmental issues, and for
them to start making commitments to these types of strategies now.
"Ultimately, adaptation has to be negotiated locally, and so we want to
combine this sort of global analysis with local engagement," he told IPS.
(END)
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