The Cost of Climate Disaster: Wildfire in Europe, Flood in China and Wildfire in Hawaii, the U.S
The economic impact of the compromise made on the environment for years back is now stirring us in the face now. It was assumed that the cost of burning cheap fuel was better than clean energy. Today the economic consequences is enormous, and the need to secure the future for the next generation is imperative.
According to Harvard Business School, We don’t know precisely how climate change will alter the planet more than it is doing presently, but two things are certain: Its complex environmental impact will directly affect business, society, and ecosystems; and governments will seek to mitigate its effects with far-reaching regulations. Until recently, companies have for the most part freely emitted carbon, but they will increasingly find that those emissions have a steep price, both monetary and social. As a result, businesses that continue to sit on the sidelines will be badly handicapped relative to those that are now devising strategies to reduce risk and find competitive advantage in a warming, carbon-constrained world.
The impact on the environment is just to confusing to everyone on earth. While some countries are suffering from heat wave, others are faced with flood, while some are battling tornado, other and confronted with draught. The diverse nature of the impact of adverse environmental problems stirs humans and other living organism in the face, as all living organism are not left out of what is befalling the earth now. The ocean recently have recorded about 0.5 degrees increase in temperature.
The wildfires ravaging Southern Europe and North Africa are set to adversely affect the local economies, particularly the tourism and agriculture sectors, and serve as a bellwether of what may come if climate change is not addressed.
Firefighters were tackling more than 100 blazes across Greece as of Wednesday, with hundreds of thousands evacuated as fires destroyed homes and businesses across islands as far apart as Rhodes in the Aegean and Corfu in the Ionian Sea.
Meanwhile, Algeria said on Wednesday it had contained deadly wildfires which have killed at least 34 people and displaced more than 1,000 others. Other countries, including Italy, Spain and Tunisia are also battling blazes as temperatures continue to soar.
“The extreme weather – an increasingly frequent occurrence in our warming climate – is having a major impact on human health, ecosystems, economies, agriculture, energy and water supplies,” Petteri Taalas, secretary-general of the World Meteorological Organization, said on Tuesday.
“This underlines the increasing urgency of cutting greenhouse gas emissions as quickly and as deeply as possible. In addition, we have to step up efforts to help society adapt to what is unfortunately becoming the new normal.”
Southern Europe’s heatwave will bring challenges and costs as the severity increases, Moody’s Ratings agency said in a report this week. The heatwaves may reduce the region’s attractiveness to tourists in the longer term or “at the very least reduce demand in summer”, which will have negative economic consequences, it said.
For Greece alone, the travel and tourism sector’s gross domestic product contribution last year grew by more than 38 per cent to reach nearly €38 billion ($42 billion), representing 18.5 per cent of its economy, according to the World Travel and Tourism Council. The sector also created 5,000 more jobs, compared to the previous year, to reach almost 800,000 jobs nationally.
However, Greek Environment and Energy Minister Theodoros Skylakakis said only a “very small” number of tourists were affected by the fires. “The tourist industry as a whole is handling this issue. It [has] not affected massively our tourism industry until now,” he told Bloomberg TV on Tuesday.
Agriculture plays a small role in most of the affected countries’ economies and the current heatwave is likely to have relatively limited economic implications, although it could affect food prices, Moody’s said.
In this analysis, we shall be looking at the adverse impact of climate change on the Business ecosystem in Europe, China and America where major global economy are located.