As reports said El Nino phenomenon had contributed to spell that has seen fires raging through Canada’s Alberta province, the United Nations has asked called for coordinated efforts to prevent weather extremes resulting from disturbed atmospheric patterns.
A Bloomberg report says wildfires racing in oil-rich Alberta region fed on conditions disturbed by an El Nino in the equatorial Pacific ocean, which prolonged a dry fall and then little snow in the winter and soaring temperatures did the rest to fuel fires.
The blaze, sweeping over 90 sq kms has consumed entire neighborhoods in Fort McMurray, and has seen one of the largest evacuations in Canada in recent times. Around 1600 homes have been destroyed by the spreading fire.
“We must remember that El Niño is not a one-off event but recurring global phenomena that we must address for future generations and to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),” said ECOSOC President Oh Joon at a meeting at the UN Headquarters in New York.
“All partners, the United Nations, international and regional organizations, civil society, the private sector and the scientific community, need to take coordinated and fortified action to tackle El Niño risks,” he added.
According to the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), as of February 2016, almost one million children needed treatment for acute malnutrition in Eastern and Southern Africa from food shortages due to El Niño weather extremes.
Since 2015, the world has witnessed the largest El Niño occurrence to date, with many developing countries in Latin America, Africa, Asia and the Pacific suffering under its “devastating and far-reaching impacts,” according to the UN official.
“Extreme weather conditions have become more frequent with climate change, bringing droughts, fire, destruction of agricultural production, poor health and diseases, and displacement of people all over the world. These conditions also affect commodity prices and the prospects for sustainable development,” Joon stressed.
Already, Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia and Palau have all declared states of emergency due to drought conditions from El Niño, while Malawi has declared “a state of disaster.”
Meanwhile, according to Elena Manaenkova, Assistant Secretary-General of the World Meteorological Organization, scientific understanding of El Niño has increased greatly in recent years, the current 2015/16 unprecedented El Niño and future events are entering “uncharted territories.”
“Our planet has altered dramatically because of climate change, the general trend towards a warmer global ocean, the loss of Arctic sea ice and of over a million square kilometres of summer snow cover in the northern hemisphere. This naturally occurring El Niño event and human induced climate change may interact and modify each other in ways, which we have never before experienced,” she said.
Also speaking at the meeting, Robert Glasser, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction, noted that although it is too early to assess the full impacts of the current El Niño, it is certain that countries have greater economic exposure to El Niño-related events, while the proportional impact on people and their livelihoods is higher in low-income countries and small island developing States.
Glasser says as a result of more accurate seasonal forecasts, there is an increased predictability of occurrence of El Niño cycles and occurrence of extreme events in general.
The current El Niño, according to the official, has manifested in extreme weather events that have had an impact on a number of countries across the world and affected an estimated 60 million people so far.
Some countries have experienced greater precipitation leading to floods, while others have experienced severe droughts affecting crop yields, and livestock production leading to food and water shortages, the official said.
