‘Seven of 10 cities with highest number of people at risk of being displaced are in Asia’

Shanghai, Hong Kong, Kolkata, Mumbai, Dhaka, Jakarta and Hanoi among cities most vulnerable

If the Paris climate talks cannot steer the world from its current path toward a 4 degree Celsius rise in temperatures, sea rise will subsume coastlines that are now home to 470 million to 760 million people, according to a November study by the non-profit research and news organisation Climate Central.

Asia has seven of the 10 megacities with the highest number of people at risk of being displaced, the report says: Shanghai, Hong Kong, Kolkata and Mumbai, Dhaka, Indonesia’s Jakarta and Vietnam’s Hanoi.

Businesses worried about risks to production and profits are pushing hard in Paris for strong action. Banks have pledged green energy funds.

“The interests of governments, the private sector and cities are aligning as never before,” UN climate chief Christiana Figueres said Sunday in Paris. “We are witnessing the turning point in the way the global economy prices pollution and invests in real wealth.”

The stakes are high. In Southeast Asia alone, the Asian Development Bank expects climate change to cause losses that will reduce the region’s potential GDP by 11 per cent this century.

But there’s a flip side to the gloomy projections. Countries and businesses that are preparing for climate change could reap considerable financial benefits.

“When there’s an improvement, it enhances the competitive of those cities,” said Tatiana Gallego-Lizon, director of the bank’s division on urban development and water.

Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, holds sprawling slums to which millions have fled when seas swallowed their coastal homes.

AP Jakarta A motorist rides on a bridge built on an area regularly flooded with seawater in Jakarta, Indonesia.

AP Vulnerable ones Unchecked sea rise will subsume coastlines that are home to up to 760 million people.

AP Flood defences Workers build a wall to be used as a barrier to keep out sea water in Jakarta.

AP Mumbai India’s financial hub of Mumbai has an annual GDP of about $151 billion, with some 2.8 million people crammed into low-lying slums that flood regularly.