Planet B

Recent increases in crop prices associated with unprecedented weather conditions have reminded me of the 2007 M&S marketing campaign which said, “Plan A: Because there is no Plan B”. In this case, it should be “Planet A: Because there is no Planet B”.

To me climate change is undeniable. If you take an area that was previously covered in trees and cover it with concrete the climate will necessarily change. At this point I am not conjecturing how and to what extent, but merely that it will. This is why the Global Warming movement have moved on to talking about Climate Change rather than Global Warming since the latter would be ridiculed by people during cold snaps even if they were making a mockery of their understanding of the word “global”. Strangely “Global” was never meant to mean “localised and at all times” and “warming” was never meant to mean “it will be warm”, but that is how those who did not want to make any sacrifices today to secure a more certain future took it.

Either way Climate Change and Global Warming are a reality – the NASA Earth Observatory provide a great summary if you are interested.

The unfortunate reality is that there is no Planet B. Our planet is the only inhabitable one that anyone is aware of and so we have to ensure that we keep this one “fit-for-purpose”, for want of a better turn of phrase.

As I see it, each generation should try to ensure that they leave behind a “better” planet than the one they were passed by the previous generation. To aim for anything less is selfish and disrespectful both to those in the past that strove so hard for us to be here and to those in the future whose lives will be determined by our legacy.

We do not yet know whether we have put the world onto an unsustainable spiral of warming; nature tends to have decent self-rectifying mechanisms and man is still relatively puny compared to nature (though ever less so), so one hopes not.  But we need to seriously start sooner rather than later in addressing these issues.  To date the EU has done some great work and there have been smatterings of policy action, but events such as the recent droughts serve as a wake-up call. We need to alter our priorities meaningfully and put the necessary resources and incentives into addressing these issues.

Many would argue that a time of economic crisis is not a good one for addressing such issues. Unfortunately, the current economic environment is here to stay in my view, so they are effectively arguing to delay any mitigation indefinitely. Surely the future of our planet and way of life must take precedence.