A major climate change summit brought together leaders from the world's 20 top polluting countries in Mexico to tackle the crisis as part of the G8 Gleneagles Dialogue. As the summit wrapped up yesterday, Tearfund has called for more urgency to address the problem.
The Christian relief and development agency expressed its "relief" today that the world's top 20 polluting countries finally agreed at the summit that the climate change problem was undeniable.
It added stressed, however, that much more needed to be done: "This is a modest step only. For most of the rest of the planet, the fact of climate change is common-knowledge. And until consensus over the science is matched with more ambitious targets and policy measures to tackle climate change, there will be little positive progress, particularly for the poorest people of the world."
As the country representatives gathered in Mexico, Tearfund warned that thousands of lives, as well as tens of billions of dollars in development work, would be lost in poor countries if more urgent action was not taken now.
Tearfund Advocacy Director, Andy Atkins stressed that international progress on climate change is too slow.
"Poor communities where Tearfund's partners work have been living with the impact of climate change for several decades - erratic rains, increasing numbers of disasters, floods and droughts. These poor communities, who have contributed least to climate change, are suffering the most from its effects. Current efforts to respond to climate change are simply not urgent enough."
