Time running out for climate change

DURBAN is bracing for a weekend of heavy rain that has nothing to do with the impending cyclone wreaking havoc across the southern Indian Ocean.

Gauteng has had one of its wettest summers in years, while, for many weeks, Capetonians were either freezing or sweltering. Parts of the Northern Cape and the Free State will probably be flooded by Monday.

There doesn’t seem to be a happy medium: it’s either deluge or drought, oven or fridge, but we know this. Scientists have been warning for years of the impact of climate change, driven for the most part by global warming. Sociologists and economists have been telling us of the consequences of doing nothing.

The predictions are dire: rising food and water insecurity, conflict, war and mass migration by people.

Africa, after centuries of enduring the depredations of colonisation, is going to bear the brunt of climate change, with sizeable parts of our landmass already desert.

Here in South Africa, the issue is made that much worse by the levels of inequality, coupled to the disrepair of municipal water reticulation systems leading to unprecedented loss and pollution of a scarce resource. As for power, the government seems hellbent on holding fast to carbon energy solutions, even though Eskom is the world’s worst sulphur dioxide polluter. That’s before you start factoring in the price of acid mine drainage and windborne asbestosis, the toxic legacy of our mining industry.

The problem is the government doesn’t seem to care. One day, the issue will be moot because it will be too late to do anything. There needs to be a concerted move towards mitigating climate change and, as we begin to emerge from Covid-19, to build back better.

There’s never been a better time to do just that.