Climate change has not been addressed at the government level, so how are we dealing with climate change?
At the government level, there is a thought that climate change needs to be dealt with. Accordingly, national policies are needed to be designed and the government is working to that end. But I have no idea about how far we have reached in the process. But I do not think there is anything being implemented at a practical level in this regard.
What is the reason behind it, is it indifference?
The problem in Nepal is that firstly, there is an overarching thought that it is an international agenda, a global agenda propagated by the donor community. Moreover, I do not think the policy makers are aware of the fact that there is a local-national implication of climate change. Additionally, climate change is dealt with by the Ministry of Science and Technology, but the actual and specific policies and programs need to be designed by other sectors like agriculture and production sectors. There is no program to deal with the impact of climate change on these sectors.
They have just started linking these programs with climate change. The Ministry of Science and Technology has limited itself just to finding funds for national and international seminars on climate change, participating in them and disseminating ideas.
Primarily, there is a lack of awareness at the government level on what climate change is, forget about public awareness about this issue. How does it affect life? And in what ways? Most importantly, is climate change a problem or a process? There is no clarity on these issues.
What type of local implications does climate change have?
The thing in case of Nepal is that climate change directly affects areas that are mountainous. Mountainous areas have micro environment that are fast affected by climate change in different ways. The main implication is rise in temperature. Extreme events occur in increased frequency and their variability is more. Due to this variability, the type of effect that it has on our agriculture, our urban areas, our industries that depend on the raw materials and their production, water resources and irrigation are extensive and the effects vary with altitude. The increase in altitude means increased climatic variability. Temperature rise means that cultivation of crops that could was not possible in the hilly regions in the past becomes now possible. But, the hills are not appropriate for cultivation as the soil is thin in the hills. In some cases, agriculture productivity may rise but the space and capacity of the terrain are limited. Temperature rise means an increased demand for water, soils turn dry and their moisture retaining capacity goes down. The crops that took longer to ripe in the past are ripening faster these days. Therefore, a lot of things are affected at once but these the effects do not appear overnight. It happens at a slow pace. Let’s take the case of temperature rise: The climate change panel says that temperature will rise by something between 1.5 and 4.5 degrees centigrade in between 2000 and 2050. This is a huge rise. In the last 1000 years, temperature rose by 1 degree centigrade. So, temperature is rising by 0.25 degree centigrade or something every year. It affects each and every production process. There are initial effects like drought and variability in rainfall. Contrastingly, there are instant shocks like 24 hours of massive rainfall, cloud bursts or floods.
It’s not that people had not experienced these things in the past, but there is a difference between the effects experienced in the past and now. Earlier, people adapted to these things traditionally in a slow process. The current scenario is that these effects are so sudden that one is more vulnerable to varied risks. These implications demand a through knowledge of the ways in which one can deal with these risks. The things that need to be addressed are cultivation of crops according to the risks involved, management of the risks, irrigation management, crop switching and so on. These are highly important things that the government needs to be aware of. Farmers are doing their bit to cope and the government needs to assist them in this process.
One is the mitigation aspect of this issue, i.e. steps that deter the process of climate change, like decreasing the greenhouse effect and increasing forest cover. Secondly, it is the management of the risks that are already there. They are tough tasks and both kinds of activities should be carried out simultaneously rather than sequentially. Our policymakers are just getting a comprehensive knowledge about these things. The way the government is going to deal with climate change is still in its initial phase. DFID, World Bank, UNDP are interested in these areas but they are interested according to their priorities.
Do they have vested interests?
No, not vested interests but in the absence of a lucid national policy, they design their programs based on what they think is right.
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