Читать книгу How Can I Stop Climate Change: What is it and how to help - Литагент HarperCollins USD, F. M. L. Thompson - Страница 76

It’s easy to see the immediate costs of clearing up damage caused by floods, storms or warping railway tracks; less obviously, farmers across the world are paying the price in lost harvests, lower yields and higher prices. People who rely on rainforests for food, farming and forestry are losing their way of life.

In the developed world, the insurance industry generally picks up the tab for extreme weather. But in Europe the cost of flood damage alone would be expected to rise by up to £82 billion a year, and the costs of Hurricane Katrina have been put at US $125 billion. Many people in the poorest countries do not have insurance policies; but even in the rich developed world, many can’t afford insurance as the risk of extreme weather rises – particularly for those living in flood plains.

An economic assessment of the cost of climate change, commissioned by the UK Government and published in 2006, suggested that unchecked climate change could damage economic well-being worldwide by at least 5 per cent and by as much as 20 per cent. In other words a fifth of the world economy is at risk.

‘The impacts of climate change are not evenly distributed – the poorest countries and people will suffer earliest and most.’ The Stern Review, October 2006