What Does Climate Change Look Like Throughout the World?
20 Photos That Tell the Story
Climate Change is the reality of everyday life for people all over the planet. How we experience climate change of course, varies greatly. With the #EverydayClimateChange Instagram account and hashtag that launched in January of 2015 we get a glimpse into stories of climate change from throughout the world.
We live in a global age of storytelling and over the month of April we will be featuring a Global story projects every day of the month as we get ready to launch our Malcolm X Global Digital Media Fellows Program in May.
Do you have a suggestion for a storytelling project that we should feature? Tag us on Instagram, Facebook or tweet us at @UmmahWide
Philippines — “Two young boys play with a plastic bag in the sea bordering the Baseco slum, Metro Manila, Philippines. Urban environmental problems such as air pollution, water pollution, flooding and congestion are more pronounced in city slums. Slum dwellers’ living conditions depict poverty in terms of both inadequate incomes and environmental deprivation. The Baseco slum, for example, has been built directly on reclaimed swampland behind and on top of the sea wall which protects the Baseco Bay.
This settlement is particularly vulnerable to hurricanes and tsunamis due to its location…The impact of climate change is likely to increase the occurrence of extreme weather conditions.”
Between July 2011 and mid-2012, a severe drought affected the entire East Africa region. Said to be “the worst in 60 years”, the drought caused a severe food crisis across Somalia, Djibouti, Ethiopia and Kenya that threatened the livelihood of 9.5 million people.” Photography by @matildegattoni
“As in other developing countries, women in the Amazon bear a disproportional burden as threats like oil extraction, mega-dams and climate change impacts their traditional territories and environment. It is in the daily lives of these women — who are highly dependent on local natural resources for their livelihood — that the battle to save the family, traditional ways of life and the future of their children is played out. They are standing up for their rights, for the rights of nature and for future generations in a rapidly growing movement to protect their rainforest homelands across the Amazon basin. As female givers of life, the women of the Amazon have felt a great responsibility to lead the struggles against the destruction of Pachamama, our “life giving Mother Earth.”
Xavante people in Maraiwatsede Land in 2010 — “Local communities are very important to protecting the world’s last remaining forests. According to The Rights and Resources Initiative, indigenous peoples hold legal rights to one-eighth of the world’s forests, about 513 million hectares. The Maraiwatsede , the indigenous people in the picture, got his land back last year, after decades of dispute with cattle ranchers and soya farmers. Local communities are helping to protect forests and reduce greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation.”
Niger — “A Tuareg family gathers around their family tent. A few months ago, after loosing all their livestock due to a severe drought they decided to settle in Tudu (no man’s land in Hausa), an area in the outskirts of Agadez mainly occupied by Tuareg families who were forced to abandon the nomadic life after they have lost their livestock in drought or floods caused by climate change. Here, Tuareg families try to make a living, men work as daily labourers and women weave carpets to sell at the nearest market. While the older generation refuses to adapt to sedentarization and dreams of returning to the desert, the younger generation wishes they could move to a brick house in town and mix with the rest of the population. Niger is one of the world’s most vulnerable countries because of its exposure to climate risks and its landlocked position. Its vulnerability results in increasing desertification, drought and flooding. As only 15% of the land is arable, any additional expansion of the Sahara will be hugely detrimental to the country’s economy and to our livelihoods.”
South Africa — “Sugarcane fields near Melmoth in SouthAfrica are cut down and burned off after the harvest in 1998. “South Africa is a major emitter of greenhousegases. The emission rate is at almost ten tonnes of CO2 per person per year — 43% more than the global average. As a signatory to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol, South Africa has made a voluntary commitment to combat climate change. It aims at reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 34% by 2020 and 42% by 2025.”
Indonesia — “A man in Jakarta walks past a river that has been covered with refuse, in a slum community in the Muaru Baru district of Jakarta. Citywide floods in early 2013 washed large amounts of refuse into some communities, completely blocking the flow of waterways. Located on the northern shores of the island of Java, the Indonesian capital of Jakarta is on the front line of climate change. 40% of the city lies below sea-level and this coastal capital is being subjected to regular floods, intensified by the creeping waters which slowly engulf parts of the city as sea-levels rise. Combined with storm water runoff from deforested mountains near the city, this urban area is one of the world’s most severely affected by climactic change.”
Madagascar — “In the middle of a forest in #Madagascar a crew of independent coal producers prepare a mound for burning and cooking wood into coal. They also saw trees that they have just cut down. This activity is a serious problem for the forest and is part of the problem of unabated tree cutting and forest reduction. #Deforestation is a major component of #climatechange as it impairs the ability of our planet to cleanse carbons from the atmosphere.”
United States — “Flaring from shale gas drilling operations turns the night sky orange at a farm in northeastern Pennsylvania. USA where the rush to exploit shale has has turned farmland jnto gas fields. A 2011 report in Climate Change written by Robert w. Howarth, Renee Santoro and Anthony Ingraffea evaluated the greenhouse footprint of natural gas obtained by high-volume hydraulic fracturing from shale formations and found that the methane emissions have a 20% greater greenhouse gas footprint than coal operations. These findings challenge industry arguments that fracking and natural gas is a cleaner energy solution.”
United States — “Farm workers clear away weeds in a field of young almond trees in California’s Central Valley. The state is going through an historic and three year drought yet many farmers are planting almonds, a water intensive yet highly profitable crop. 2014 was the hottest year on record in California and water tables are frighteningly low. As global warming increases many fear that the valley will return to its desert states an devastate the economy.”
Guatemala — “A man in San Jose del Golfo, Guatemala walks through a field of dry corn caused by an extended dry season this year in Central America. The country is located in one of the world’s most vulnerable areas of climate change in the world. Droughts have been increasingly longer in recent years in this region, according to environmental experts. Guatemala ranks ninth of the ten countries most affected by climate change, according to the latest report by the NGO Germanwatch. The study shows that between 1994 and 2013 more than 530,000 people died in weather conditions worldwide.”
China — “The skyline of Beijing. China’s capital is one of the most polluted cities in the middle kingdom according to official statistics. On social media residents wonder why the government can go through extraordinary measures to clean up the environment before international events , but otherwise has been rather slow to improve the situation. Climate advocats blame the situation on China’s inefficient coal fired power plants and suggest to replace them with cleaner natural gas power stations as well as zero emission sources of electricity. (The picture was taken during a heavily polluted day through a red flower pot to ease the grey view).”
United Kingdom — “UK will see wetter, milder winters and hotter, drier summers due to global warming. Weather will become both too wet and too dry — and also too cold and too hot — as climate change increases the frequency of extreme events.
But the natural year-to-year variability of weather will also mean occasional very cold winters, like that of 2010–11, and very wet summers, like that of 2012.
Recent years have seen highly variable weather in the UK with a drought in early 2012 and the greatest deluge for 250 years and widespread flooding over the winter of 2013–14.”
Ecuador — “Cofán leader Emergildo Criollo smells remnants of crude oil in a river in the northern Ecuadorian Amazon, where a legacy of destructive oil operations continues to contaminate the region’s water supply and rainforest. Here, while drilling in the Amazon from 1964 to 1990, Texaco — which merged with Chevron in 2001 — deliberately dumped more than 18 billion gallons of toxic wastewater and left hazardous waste in hundreds of open pits dug out of the forest. The result remains one of the worst environmental disasters on the planet.”
Scotland — “An electric-powered car gets charged at the roadside, in Glasgow, Scotland. Glasgow City council has received grants from Transport Scotland with a value of over £450,000 to install these Electric Vehicle charging points (of which there are approximately 70 in the city) as part of the Plugged in Places programme, a programme which aims to expand the UK’s electric vehicle infrastructure.”
Yemen — “A farmer collecting qat in the fields.Yemen is enduring a water crises that ranks among the worst in the world. The country’s economy depends heavily on oil production, and its government receives the vast majority of its revenue from oil taxes. Yet analysts predict that the country’s petroleum output, which has declined over the last seven years, will fall to zero by 2017. The government has done little to plan for its post-oil future. Yemen’s population, already the poorest on the Arabian peninsula and with an unemployment rate of 35%, is expected to double by 2035. Having one of the world’s highest birth rates, the country’s water supply system is failing to keep pace with its ever increasing population. Sana’a may run out of water in a decade. It is common that drills have had to bore down deeper than 1,000 meters to find water in the capital. Sanaa’s well are expected to dry out by 2015, partly due to illegal drilling, partly due to the rapid urban development of the capital, partly because 40% of the city’s water is diverted for qat production, Since cultivating qat is much more profitable than any other crop and the plantations are often controlled by influential tribal leaders, it seems impossible to change this cycle. Partly because conservation rules are difficult to enforce. Only 20% of the houses receive water, the other 80% has to collect it from pumps and wells. More and more people must rely on costly water provided by water tankers, which are filled by private wells, but many cannot afford the cost of this water.15% of the urban population only uses bottled water as its primary drinking water source and that is why Yemen has one of the highest world mortality rate, most of the diseases being related to water.”
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