Rising sea brings reality home

Taken from Papua Newe Guinea Post Courier

You don’t have to be an environmentalist or a natural scientist to see and simply understand the adverse effects of global warming that results in the rise of sea levels. As a Highlander, the issue of rising sea levels and its effects did not bother me too much. However, I was inlightened when I had the opportunity to accompany National Planning and District Development Minister Paul Tiensten to a beautiful coastline village called Lawes in Manus Island recently on a fact-finding tour to the province. What I witnessed was the shocking reality of the destructive effects of global warming that is affecting innocent people, as a result of careless human actions.The beautiful village of Lawes is situated in the south-coast of Manus Island. With its pristine waters and scenic coastline, the village can be rightfully described as one of the pearls of the Pacific. It takes about 15 minutes by boat at the Loniu bridge (the bridge that connects Los Negros Island with Manus Provincial capital Lorengau) transit point to reach the village.The village is regarded by locals as the main supplier of seafood, particularly mud crabs and other garden produce such as yam and taro to the main market in Lorengau. The hospitality and friendliness of the Lawes villagers made the Minister’s small delegation feel right at home from the start when our dinghy arrived until the moment we waved good-bye to the villagers to return to Lorengau and back to Port Moresby via Kavieng on the weekly Air Niugini flight.But amid the happy innocent smiling faces of the Lawes villagers lay one sad but real scenario that they have to live and face up to at present and beyond. This is the reality of the continuous threat posed by rising sea levels, a direct result of global warming. This phenomena now threatens the earth with catastrophy and has already claimed and destroyed some of their once precious hunting grounds and continues to pose even more threats to their beautiful coastline village. The sad fact about this situation is that it is not the making of these innocent villagers that they have to face up to this scenario but it is the works of those rich and greedy powerful industrialised nations of the world and giant corporate polluters who emit hundred millions of tons of carbon monoxides into the atmosphere this is the cause.During our visit a concerned Lawes village councillor Gideon Timothy said the small coastline village, which has a population of about 700 people, first experienced the threat of rising sea level 20 years ago, in 1987. Pointing to an area now covered under the sea, Timothy said, “We used to hunt for cuscus and harvest sago around this area when I was a young boy but now it is buried under the sea water”. And he fears that the worst is yet to happen with the whole of Manus Island slowly sinking. New Manus Open MP and Inter-Government Relations Minister Job Pomat and Administrator Wep Kanawi confirmed Councillor Timothy’s fears with separate statements alluding that in fact the whole Manus Province is slowly sinking under the water. Timothy said most of the villagers in Lawes relocated further inland after first experiencing the threat of rising level but this threat has increased now and has already affected some of the villagers’ food gardens, coconut trees including the Lawes top-up primary school grounds.“We do not know where our children will hunt for protein or harvest sago, plant cocoa or palm oil 10 to 20 years from now because every moment the sea level is rising. It’s currently low tide but you can still see the effects. During high tide period, the threat gets even worse for us,” Timothy said. A young lad by the name of Pokawas Malakai took us on a tour of the affected areas of the village. Sadly young Pokawas pointed to one of several houses affected by sea water telling us that this was his home and where he grew up with his older siblings. “My parents are planning to move our house further inland because as you can see water is slowly covering up the land area where our house now stands,” 10-year-old Pokawas said, while pointing to his family home. Lawes, like many other coastal villages and islands in PNG and around the world are facing the eminent threat of being submerged by sea water as a result of rising water levels aided by wild weather due to increases in global warming.Councillor Timothy said the issue of global warming must become an important concern for governments, industries, communities and individuals in both developing and developed countries alike because it affects everyone from the Queen of England to the United States President, right down to the simple villager like himself.Fellow Lawes villager Morgan Yowat supports Timothy’s views adding that governments at all levels must respond to growing concerns about climate change by taking drastic policy actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions “It is therefore vital that policymakers and society take into account the wider social and economic implications of climate change and policies,” he said.According to a global energy report released by Exxon Mobil in early 2006, increasing population and prosperity in developing countries will drive up global energy demand. This will result in substantial increases in greenhouse gas emissions, particularly from developing countries, which will account for about 85% of the growth in CO2 emissions from 2000 through 2030.The Exxon Mobil report says that until recently, the climate policy debate focused primarily on near-term emissions reductions in the framework of targets and timetables set by the Kyoto Protocol. “The first compliance period under the Protocol will start next year and end in 2012 (2008-2012). But, among those nations ratifying the Protocol, only the European Union has been most active in seeking to implement it,” the report stated.The Mobil report further states that most nations who ratified the Protocol are not on track today to meet their 2008-2012 Kyoto targets with necessary domestic actions which means that the total shortfall several hundred million metric tons of CO2 per year. And Australia under the Howard Government is strongly opposed to the Kyoto Protocol saying that a new approach to global climate policies is still necessary, one that includes giant emitters like the United States and China who have not signed onto the Kyoto agreement. Australia is adamant that both the US and China must be serious participants if there was to be any moves towards agreeing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions on a global scale. But how serious countries like the United States is in addressing the climate change still remains a question. According to a October 24 2007 report “the White House significantly edited testimony prepared for a Senate hearing on the impact of climate change on health, deleting key portions citing diseases that could flourish in a warmer climate, documents obtained by The Associated Press showed. The White House on Wednesday denied that it had ‘’watered down’’ the congressional testimony that Dr. Julie Gerberding, director of Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, had given the day before to the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. But a draft of the testimony submitted for White House review shows that six pages of details about specific disease and other health problems that might flourish if the Earth warms were not delivered at the hearing”. The report on the White House alteration of CDC testimony further added that in another deleted section of the testimony it said ‘’Climate change-driven ecological changes such as variations in rainfall and temperature could significantly alter the range, seasonality and human incident of many zoonotic and vector-borne diseases.”The international debate on what climate policy actions to take in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions now continues, but the outcome is uncertain. But one thing is for certain, the future of youngsters like Pokawas Malakai and his innocent andbeautiful coastline village of Lawes lies in uncertainty with its fate already sealed,, along with those many islands and coastal villages in the Pacific and other parts of the world. In fact, it has already claimed a large part of his father’s once precious hunting grounds and now threatens his family home as a direct result of careless and greedy human actions in the industrialised and developed to come. Pokawas now can only surrender as the sea chips away at his beloved Manus Island in quiet whispers.