India ranks seventh among the countries most affected by climate change in 2019, according to the Global Climate Risk Index, 2021, published Monday by Germanwatch, an NGO based in Bonn, Germany.
In 2019, the monsoon continued for a month longer than normal in India. From June to the end of September 2019, it was 110% of the long-term average. Floods caused by heavy rains caused 1,800 deaths in 14 states and displaced 1.8 million people, according to the report. There were eight tropical cyclones in India. Six of them escalated to become “very severe.”
Cyclone “extremely severe” Fani affected 28 million people, killed 90 people in India and Bangladesh and caused economic losses of $ 8.1 billion, the report added.
The report said that between 2000 and 2019, more than 4.75,000 people lost their lives as a direct result of more than 11,000 extreme weather events around the world, and economic losses amounted to around US $ 2.56 trillion (in parities). purchasing power).
Globally, 11.8 million people were affected by a heavy monsoon and the economic damage was estimated at $ 10 billion.
Dr Anjal Prakash, Research Director and Adjunct Associate Professor at the Bharti Institute for Public Policy, said: “It is not surprising to learn that India appears to be in the top 10 most affected countries. As scientists at the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), we have been pointing towards an extreme risk that an emerging market like India is going to face due to very rapidly changing weather conditions. India is blessed with many ecologies: glaciers, high mountains, sprawling coastlines, and massive semi-arid regions that are the hot spots of climate change. Global warming is causing an increase in the frequency of cyclones, the melting of glaciers at a much faster rate, and heat waves. The majority of the Indian population depends on agriculture, which is severely affected by the impact of climate change. This year, many of their cities drowned in India due to the variability of the monsoon system. ”
Prakash further said that a specific national and state plan was necessary to deal with the events of climate change.
“In 2008 a national adaptation plan was prepared followed by state action plans. However, most plans lack the resources to integrate into the district’s disaster risk reduction and development plan. It is time for the government to commission specific climate risk maps of Indian districts and states to further break down this information to understand which areas need more attention than others, “he said.
The Global Climate Risk Index (CRI) analyzes the quantified impacts of extreme weather events both in terms of deaths and economic losses. The index is based on data from Munich Re’s NatCatSERVICE.
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