Now that he has the mandate to govern the United States for another four-year term as president, Barack Obama needs to speak out on global warming and climate change. I'm not talking about the single mention of the topic in his acceptance speech after winning the election, pounced on by the world's press, especially environment journalists. The line heard round the environmentalists' world: "We want our children to live in an America that isn't burdened by debt, that isn't weakened by inequality, that isn't threatened by the destructive power of a warming planet."
Of course, much was made of the fact that Hurricane Sandy, the so-called "Frankenstorm," hit the East Coast of the US hard just days before the elections and Obama was seen to take a strong, supportive stance on rescue and recovery after the storm. Even BusinessWeek surmised that the storm and the emerging pattern of more vicious Atlantic weather threatening the US in recent years was indubitably the consequence of global warming, so it was in a way unsurprising that Obama should make the statement he did–despite the three years of silence on global warming from the Obama White House, and the absence of the topic of climate change in elections campaigns by Obama and his opponent Mitt Romney.
Now that Obama has trounced Romney and has, arguably, nothing to lose from saying the words "global warming" in public, the world is waiting for what comes next. As a small island State (are we still officially a Small Island Developing State (SIDS)? Or are we considered developed now?) we in Trinidad and Tobago have a vested interest in what Obama and his Government do. The US is the Americas' largest economy and its largest greenhouse gas polluter–producing 18.27 per cent of the world's carbon dioxide emissions, according to UN statistics from 2008.
Additionally, one must consider that the footprint of the US is not just present in the air we breathe and the seas around us, but in the policies that govern the world response to climate change. Obama has given encouraging signs of interest in contributing to reversing the trend of global warming, but his official silence on the topic over the past couple years has not been good news to those who hope to effect a real change in the trend. The US must change its greenhouse-gas emissions policy and work towards a hard, enforceable world treaty on emissions with the co-operation of such countries as China and India–in addition to its current direction towards sustainable and low-carbon sources of energy. This matters to us because we are vulnerable to the effects of climate change, more so than most continental folk.
This was brought home to me when the local NGO, Sustain T&T, opened its Green Screen series of environmental films at Digicel IMAX, Woodbrook, on October 31. During the launch Solomon Loannou, charg� d'affaires of the Delegation of the European Union to Trinidad and Tobago, said that this country's average temperature has risen by one degree in recent years.
One degree might not sound like much but consider that coral reefs, such as our own Buccoo Reef, are vulnerable to increases in temperature–rising temperature kills them over time. Rising global temperatures affect sea levels, and contribute to erosion of coastlines. I don't think anybody who has seen the badly-eroded southwest coastline could easily shrug off the effects of rising sea levels. Rising temperatures affect the livelihood of our fisherfolk as fisheries are affected by changes in the oceans and seas. And though we love to boast that God is a Trini, sooner or later a Frankenstorm is going to touch us and it will not be pretty.
We have a responsibility to do what we can, as individuals, to positively affect the environment, but we also have to recognise that the quantum of our contribution to global warming is slight when all is said and done. Of course, our Government must take responsibility to do what we can as a country to reduce our own emissions and reduce our national carbon footprint, but Government also must pressure the Obama government to take action. Trinidad and Tobago is small, and only one voice, but if all the world shouts in Obama's ear about the same thing, he surely must hear and listen.