High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our Ts&Cs and Copyright Policy for more detail. Email ftsales.support@ft.com to buy additional rights. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c6446d2c-7dc0-11e4-bb0a-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz3LMHH2drx
A powerful typhoon that tore through the Philippines on the weekend has spurred calls at UN climate talks in Lima for rich countries to compensate poor nations over the impact of global warming.
Typhoon Hagupit, which a UN agency said had triggered one of the largest peacetime evacuations in history, is the third large storm to batter the Philippines during the annual climate change negotiations in the last three years.
High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our Ts&Cs and Copyright Policy for more detail. Email ftsales.support@ft.com to buy additional rights. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c6446d2c-7dc0-11e4-bb0a-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz3LMHMgHsu
Last year’s Typhoon Haiyan was one of the strongest storms ever to make landfall.
As in past years, the latest typhoon has galvanised calls at the UN talks for a system of compensation to cover loss and damage from climate change.
Many developing countries want such a plan to be included in a global climate treaty due to be sealed in Paris at the end of next year.
But wealthy nations are fiercely resisting such a move, arguing there are already refugee and aid programmes in place to cope with such disasters.
Julie-Anne Richards, of the Climate Justice Programme campaign group, said it was clear more help was needed.
It’s not possible to adapt to losing your family in a typhoon. It’s not possible to adapt to your island home going under water, she said. These are examples of loss and damage, and they show why loss and damage is so important for vulnerable countries, who want assurance that they won’t be left to suffer.
Scientists predict fierce storms are likely to become more intense as the climate changes. The number of north Atlantic hurricanes has increased since the 1970s, but there is no evidence of a global trend showing a rise in the frequency of such events.
Nearly 80 per cent of people killed by disasters in 2013 lived in Asia, according to Oxfam, even though only 43 per cent of global disasters occurred there.
The aid agency estimates Asia has borne almost half the estimated global economic cost of disasters triggered by natural phenomena in the last 20 years, amounting to almost $53bn annually.
The Financial Times Limited 2014