It is not the nature that has to change, but the humans who have to change
Before writing anything about climate change one must know what climate is. The climate is the average weather conditions or atmospheric conditions of a region over a considerable period of time. Its most important elements are temperature, pressure, wind direction and velocity, humidity, cloud cover, precipitation and sunshine. Climate change refers to long-term changes in the above-mentioned elements or changes in weather patterns. These changes may be natural or due to human activities. An example of natural change is variation in the Solar Cycle and human activities have been the main drivers of climate change.
Though humans have to fulfill some basic needs, they are greedy by nature, with the greed of livelihood. When we (humans) cross the limits of our basic needs and demands, it suddenly causes destruction in the environment. We are highly in the race for development and advancement in every field, but without knowing the interrelation between man and the environment. We make plans of concrete jungles (construction) that are going to happen in the environment or in the surroundings but forget about their ill effects on other living creatures and the atmosphere. We should do every single thing for our own development, but at the same time, we should think twice about how much (negative) impact it will bring on the environment. It means that before any construction we must take care of the environment also, which is our lifelong home not only ours but for our coming generation also. If we continue to act without thinking about the environment, the day is not far when people will face catastrophic issues in their day-to-day life.
It also happens to us, when we are in need of a tree, we cut down a tree and hardly take any initiative to plant a new tree in its place; at that time we even don’t remember that “Trees are lungs of the earth”. Globally, deforestation of around ten million hectares of forests is done by humans every year for different purposes. Deforestation also happens with other natural calamities, like natural fire. But it is also an effect of climate change.
Furthermore, air pollution is also increasing at an alarming. According to WHO’s Air Quality Database 2022, the entire global population (99%) breathes air that exceeds the WHO’s air quality limits.
Besides deforestation there are many more reasons responsible for climate change; these include the overuse of fossil fuels; making cultivated land into commercial lands like brick kilns and installation of big factories on cultivated land; putting wastage in waters bodies and making them unwanted and polluted; emission of greenhouse gases due to the burning of fossil fuels. Similarly, the source of releasing harmful gases like carbon dioxide and methane gases are transport and excessive use of coal. Increasing methane gas (level/ percentage) in the atmosphere is threatening different wildlife species. It also causes some serious diseases like Asthma and even cancer due to smog. And day-to-day emissions continue to rise, as a result, the Earth is now about 1.1 °c warmer than it was in the late 1800s. The last decade (2011-2020) was the warmest on record and recently 2022 was declared the warmest year in the world.
There are numerous consequences of climate change and some of them include the drying up of lakes, droughts, severe fire, rising sea levels, declining biodiversity, etc. Here it is pertinent to mention that rising sea levels from 1901-2018, globally averaged 15-25 cm or 1-2 mm per year on average. Now the rate is accelerating and the sea level is now rising by 3.7 mm per year. It is mostly caused by the continual melting of land-based ice sheets and glaciers and by coastal inundation. Later, it affects the livelihood of the people living in coastal areas. We, as humans, disturb the ‘heat budget’ (i.e., the balance maintained between incoming solar radiation and the outgoing terrestrial radiation) of the planet Earth. Climate change has also accelerated the hydrological cycle.
Some of us may say (out of ignorance) that nothing will affect us, but climate change has a deep-rooted impact on us. Poverty, high illiteracy rate, and unemployment will have their ill effects on the future civilization itself. We say we hold nature, but no nature has its own course. If we continue to destroy the landscape created by Nature, the day is not far when Nature will surely get its revenge on us (Covd-19 global pandemic and the miseries faced by humans during this period a recent example). Nature gives us (back) what we give it: good or bad. We keep our homes clean and fresh, but we don’t care about the home (planet Earth) which the Creator made millions of years ago; we destroy it day by day: everyone is ambitious to build a swimming pool in their yards but on the other side we destroy and pollute natural swimming pools (lakes and rivers).
So change in climate impacts the natural physical environment, human systems and ecosystem. It is our responsibility to manage the risks of climate extremes at every level (local, national and international levels) and adopt a sustainable development model. We often blame nature, which is totally injustice; it is not nature that has to change, but it is us (the humans) who have to change by taking steps like afforestation, reducing carbon emissions levels, reducing concrete jungles and recycling paper and plastic, etc.
Let’s act as caretakers of the environment; let’s stay on “Mother Earth” without polluting it.
Fayaz Ahmad (Faiz) is a BA 6th semester student of Govt Degree College Sogam, Lolab (Kupwara)