Human Development Reports - United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)

No Global Issue More Urgent Than Climate Change

Pacific Magazine

There is no issue that merits more urgent attention or more immediate action right now in the world than climate change, according to Thomas Lynge Jensen, Associate Program Specialist for the UNDP’s Regional Energy Program for Poverty Reduction Centre in Bangkok.
 
Speaking to regional media in Samoa today, Jensen said this urgency was also included in the Human Development Report (2007/2008) released by UNDP.  The report emphasized that while climate change will undermine international efforts to combat poverty, it must be seen that “the fight against poverty and the fight against the effects of climate change as interrelated efforts”.

Jensen said that climate change is not only an environment issue but also a human development issue that regional governments must include in their policies.
  
“It is the defining human development issue of our generation.”

He is optimistic that climate change is still a preventable crisis, “but only just … the world has less than a decade to change course”.

Some of the findings on mitigation that Jensen highlighted are: transforming the way that we produce and use energy and that over the next few decades, the world needs an energy revolution that enables all countries to become low-carbon economies

Some examples of key results of UNDP effort highlighted by Jensen include:

• 15 country and regional assessments of the key energy issues, barriers to the development of renewable energy to mitigate climate change, and capacity development needs for removing the barriers;
• Preparatory work for possible grid-connected wind farm on Rarotonga, Cook Islands including feasibility study, wind measurement, wind resource assessment and geo-technical analysis; 
• Preparatory work for possible grid-connect wind farm including wind measurements: Upolu (Samoa), Rotuma (Fiji) and Funafuti (Tuvalu);  
• Preparatory work underway to assess and prepare for 100 percent of power supply in Tokelau to provided via solar and coconut oil; and
• Global market survey of small scale wind turbines in the context of Pacific Island Countries

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