WARMEST DECADE YET WITH IMPROVED DISASTER PREPAREDNESS:
Why in the News?
- The World Meteorological Organization reports that the 2011-2020 decade was the warmest on record.
- Despite the rising temperatures, it witnessed the lowest number of deaths from extreme events, attributing this to enhanced early warning systems and better disaster management.
Report Highlights:
- Glaciers worldwide thinned by approximately 1 meter per year on average from 2011 to 2020.
- Greenland and Antarctica experienced a 38% increase in ice loss compared to the previous decade.
- The report mentions the 2021 Uttarakhand rock-avalanche triggered by a breach in the Nanda Devi glacier, emphasizing the environmental impact.
- Positive Trends:
- The report highlights the first decade since 1950 without a single short-term event causing 10,000 or more deaths.
- The ozone hole showed visible signs of recovery during this period, marking a positive environmental shift.
Climate Change Challenges and Financial Investment:
- Human-induced climate change heightened risks from extreme heat events, with heatwaves causing the highest number of casualties.
- Tropical cyclones led to the most significant economic damage.
- Public and private climate finance nearly doubled during the decade, but there’s a call for a sevenfold increase by the decade’s end to achieve climate objectives, including limiting global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
About World Meteorological Organization (WMO)
- WMO is an intergovernmental organization with 192 Member States and Territories, including India.
- Originating from the International Meteorological Organization (IMO) established in 1873, WMO became a specialized agency of the United Nations on March 23, 1950.
- It focuses on meteorology, operational hydrology, and related geophysical sciences.
- Its headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland.