Here’s how climate change will impact you

Apart from the usual implications of extreme heat and rain on worker productivity and cultivation seasons, the long-term effects that climate change and the rising temperatures will have on the communities, and thereby the economy, is yet to be comprehensively understood and tackled. And that’s one of the gravest of concerns that Sri Lanka is wholly unprepared for – Pic by Shehan Gunasekara

By Anuradha Withanachchi 

With youth taking the centre stage in activism for climate change on 15 March, mobilising a record number of students across the world (1.5 million students, from 2,000 places in 125 countries), it seems opportune to highlight why actions of such massive scale is a necessity now more than ever. 

With Sri Lanka being identified as one of the major hotspots (according to a report by the World Bank, a hotspot is a location where changes in average weather affects the living standards negatively), and some four million people in the country being projected to be severely affected by 2020, it’s imperative to know exactly how and how disastrous the consequences of this threat will be. 

1. Agriculture and agricultural productivity

Our agriculture sector, which consists of domestic and export sub-sectors, contributes to our economy in the forms of income, employment, foreign exchange, food and raw material along with the stimulation of the growth of the economy through its links to all the other sectors. 

In numbers, the agriculture sector makes up nearly 7% of the contribution to the GDP, absorbs nearly 30% of the country’s labour force, is the livelihood to 70% of the rural population, utilises 43% of the total land area of the country, provides nearly 80% of domestic food requirement and thus remains as the cornerstone of the Lankan economy.  

Climate change and the resultant erratic rain patterns, and extreme swings between droughts and rainfall, directly affects agricultural productivity, heavily. Simply put, the unreliability of their livelihood and thereby the limited water and food sources becomes a battle between life and death.  

2. Standard of living

Sri Lanka, as a lower middle-income country has been seeing growth at a steady rate of 5.8% since 2010. The island is already operating on a temperature above the optimal level, and that coupled with the increasing temperatures, will negatively affect the consumption expenditures. Based on this, the standard of living is projected to decline by a massive 7% in Sri Lanka. 

Apart from the usual implications of extreme heat and rain on worker productivity and cultivation seasons, the long-term effects that climate change and the rising temperatures will have on the communities, and thereby the economy, is yet to be comprehensively understood and tackled. And that’s one of the gravest of concerns that Sri Lanka is wholly unprepared for.

3. Natural hazards 

With Sri Lanka being listed in the top of the most affected countries by extreme weather events in 2017 in the Global Climate Risk Index, by now the implications of such hazards are obvious. 

The masses that queued up for drought relief and the floods that affected the same masses in the northern region in December 2018, are evidence to the rise in such hazards. With Sri Lanka already being listed as one of the countries most vulnerable to climate change, the nature of the disastrous future that awaits us is evident. 

And this is exactly why events like the Global Climate Strike is important to us. Without significant changes from the bigger countries around the world, small islands like us, stand no chance. 

So, recognise what threatens our world, stand in solidarity with those who speak out about it or have the luxury to do so and start contributing to combat this problem in every possible way, no matter how minute—even by way of sharing a social media post about adaptation work, because awareness matters. 

Sri Lanka is currently benefitting from the Climate Change Adaptation Project – II (CCAP – II), funded by the Adaptation Fund, implemented by the United Nations Development Programme, The World Food Programme and the Ministry of Mahaweli Development and Environment. CCAP – II, aids marginalised communities by facilitating the establishment of alternative, climate resilient livelihoods and through capacity development of the local government, extension officers to cope with the novel challenges they now face.  

Despite such adaptation and preventative work, our country has a long walk remaining towards climate resilience, and all Sri Lankans are required to persevere through this challenge. So, while we rejoice in the efforts of such adaptation work we must also remember, climate change is a problem with a deadline, and each day we’re edging closer to it with no plan of survival.

(Anuradha Withanachchi is a UN Youth Volunteer in Knowledge Management, as a part of the Climate Change Adaptation Project II at UNDP Sri Lanka.)

(UNLOCKED is a space for Sri Lankan youth to express their views and opinions on development with the aim of creating positive change in the world. The views expressed in the blogs are solely those of the authors. UNDP Sri Lanka and Daily FT does not represent or endorse the views expressed in these blogs. Read more about the UNLOCKED initiative www.lk.undp.org.)