Taking stock of climate change amid pandemic

Context: Human-induced climate change has resulted in many negative impacts which need to be assessed from India’s perspective.

Negative impacts of climate change:

• New zoonotic infections: like Covid-19 are known to spread to humans due to destruction of natural habitats and forests. 
• Locust attacks: induced by unseasonal rainfall in East Africa.
• Intensity and frequency of cyclonic storms: is closely linked with global and regional climatic changes.
• Human migration: from drought-affected regions is a result of changing weather patterns. 

Climate Change Assessment report findings of Ministry of Earth Science for India:

• Rise in Temperature: India’s average temperature has risen by around 0.7 °C during 1901-2018.

• Himalayan Region: The increase in temperature is 1.3°C.
• Tropical Indian Ocean: surface temperature has risen by 1 °C on average (higher than the global average of 0.7 °C) during 1951-2015.

• Decrease in rainfall: The monsoon rainfall over India has decreased by about 6% between 1951 and 2015. 

• Indo-Gangetic Plains and the Western Ghats have seen notable decrease. 
• It has resulted in more droughts in central India.

• Increase in extreme events: such as heat waves, increase in the intensity of severe cyclones and changes in the monsoon system.
• Impact of human-induced climate change: The average temperature is projected to rise by about 4.4°C relative to the 1976-2005 average by the end of this century.

Conclusion: Climate change is a multidisciplinary subject. So a coordinated approach is needed to all aspects of climate change research, so that effective policy actions can be initiated at national and state levels.