Yale Bulletin and Calendar

November 11, 2005|Volume 34, Number 11

Economist says climate change
hits the poor hardest

The world's poor are especially vulnerable to climate change, said economist Jeffrey Sachs at a recent Yale conference.

Titled "Global Warming: Looking Beyond Kyoto," the conference was hosted on Oct. 21 and 22 by the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization. The event brought together scientists, policy-makers and scholars to discuss how to pursue an international consensus on the real dimensions of the problem of global warming.

In addition to Sachs, the featured speakers included Senator Joseph Lieberman and Ernesto Zedillo, director of the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization and former president of Mexico, who presented introductory remarks.

Sachs, director of Columbia University's Earth Institute and author of "The End of Poverty," spoke to a full house on Friday evening. He noted that the world is already on the verge of significant climate change, that no progress has been made on adaptation, only on mitigation, and that we need new technologies to deal with the growing demand for energy for successful development prospects.

Ultimately, he said, serious global discussions are needed to break out of the "trap" of the U.S. non-participation in the Kyoto Protocol, an international treaty calling for reduced carbon dioxide emissions.

Lieberman, co-sponsor of the Lieberman-McCain Climate Stewardship and Innovation Act, identified global warming as not only an environmental problem, but also as an opportunity to build a framework for mutual security among the world's nations. He commended the 140 nations that ratified the Kyoto Protocol and called for the United States to "step up and do its part."

He noted that we must move ahead as a global community solving global challenges with the U.S. taking the role as leader.

Other conference presentations -- all of which are available online at www.ycsg.yale.edu -- focused on anthropogenic climate change; vulnerabilities to climate change in fragile systems such as the Arctic and Africa; discussions of climate policies in the European Union, the United Kingdom, Russia and Canada; and the links between climate change control and development policies in China, India and Brazil.

The Yale Center for the Study of Globalization studies problems that, even if they do not result directly from globalization, are worldwide in nature and can therefore be effectively addressed only through international cooperation.

For more information, contact the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization at (203) 432-1900 or globalization@yale.edu.

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