Q & A

How is climate change a human crisis? Why is Oxfam campaigning on global warming?

People like to talk about global warming like it's a problem to deal with in the future. But the reality is that poor people are already struggling with it right now. You don't have to go to drought-riddled Ethiopia or flood-threatened Cambodia or malaria-prone South Africa to witness it. Just take a trip to the hurricane-battered US Gulf Coast or look at the damage done by the wildfires in California. Climate change kills off crops, destroys homes, and creates massive refugee problems. There's no time to waste. We must help poor communities deal with the effects right now.

As an international relief and development organization dedicated to finding lasting solutions to poverty and injustice, Oxfam America is bringing the human dimension to the climate change debate. We believe that in order for communities to adapt to climate change—indeed, in order for them to begin overcoming poverty—they must take early action to reduce their vulnerability and build their resilience to new and heightened risks.

If we act quickly, we can reduce the damaging impact that climate change has on poor people's lives and livelihoods. But if we fail to help in time, they will suffer far greater damage, and at a much higher human and financial cost.

What is Oxfam's Climate Change campaign looking to do?

We are asking that Congress and the Obama administration craft national legislation—and help negotiate an international agreement—that goes beyond curbing the emissions that cause global warming; they must also set aside funding to help poor people "adapt" to current and future climate change impacts.

Policy makers call this "adaptation," but what they really mean is helping vulnerable communities become stronger, more prepared, and resilient, in the face of climate change. With support, these communities can invest in a variety of cost-effective projects that not only build their resilience to climate change but help them overcome poverty in the long term. Some examples include the following:

• Drought-resistant seeds and food banks for times of shortage
• Coastal tree barriers and raised homes during floods
• Mosquito nets and health surveillance systems to prevent the spread of malaria and other climate-related illnesses

Poor communities have the knowledge and experience to craft their own adaptation solutions. They just need the funding and ability to participate in shaping these responses.

How can I help?

We have a crucial window of opportunity right now. Members of Congress are developing a number of legislative proposals on climate change and energy. At key moments in the debate, Oxfam will call on our supporters to make sure this legislation not only curbs our greenhouse gas emissions but also contains money that helps poor communities here and around the world cope with the current and future impacts of climate change. With this kind of assistance, poor people can design and implement their own climate solutions, such as drought-resistant seeds and food banks in times of shortage, coastal tree barriers and raised homes during floods, and mosquito nets and health surveillance to prevent the spread of disease. Through this legislation, the US should also help developing countries reduce their own emissions.

Such comprehensive legislation will not only directly impact poor people's lives but will help build momentum for the international negotiations now taking place at the UN and culminating at the international conference on climate in Copenhagen in December. Throughout this year, Oxfam will call on Obama's administration to show leadership in securing a global solution that supports adaptation efforts and emission reductions. We will need help from our supporters to send this message.

Tell me more about adaptation. What exactly is it? What does it look like?

When countries and communities adapt to climate change, they are problem-solving: taking early action to reduce their vulnerabilities and build their resilience to new and heightened risks. Some examples in developing countries include the following:

Problem: Increased flooding

Solutions: Upgrading national flood early warning systems and raising community awareness, building new homes and schools on raised foundations, building high platforms for emergency flood shelters, integrating flood risks into governmental planning and budgeting processes, and creating community-based action plans for responding to floods.

Problem: Lower or more erratic rainfall levels

Solutions: Upgrading national meteorological systems and medium-term forecasts; researching, testing, and growing drought-tolerant crop varieties; installing efficient, low-cost irrigation systems; installing rainwater-harvesting systems; and spreading water-conserving farming practices.

Problem: More severe or frequent hurricanes

Solutions: Upgrading hurricane early warning systems and community awareness, planting mangrove buffers along the coast to diffuse storm waves, and changing building regulations in order to reinforce new infrastructure.

Some examples in the US include the following:

Problem: Flooding

Solutions: Building climate-resilient housing, restoring coastal buffers, developing better water management systems, and improving emergency response systems to focus more on highly vulnerable populations, including low-income people.

Where will the money to pay for adaptation come from?

The US must find new money to help the poorest people adapt and build up their resilience; it must not be diverted from our already overstretched aid budgets for other much-needed anti-poverty programs. New national climate change legislation could raise these much-needed funds by installing a cap-and trade system. Under a cap-and-trade system, a "cap" or a legal limit on the total amount that countries can pollute, is established. Total emissions allowed under the cap are then divided into individual permits.

The government can either give permits away to companies for free or sell them through an auction. Oxfam is advocating for a cap-and-trade system that sells allowances through an auction and makes companies pay for their own pollution. Such auctions level the playing field and reduce emissions over time, as dirtier and less efficient energy producers will have to purchase more allowances—or reduce their pollution out of financial necessity. The revenue from these auctions could then be invested in helping poor communities here and abroad so that they can adapt to the impacts of climate change.

In addition, other sources of funding could provide resources for adaptation, including carbon taxes or fees, appropriations, or provisions in energy legislation.

How does cap-and-trade work?

Because a cap restricts the amount of pollution that can be emitted, the permits take on a financial value. This is where trading comes in. Companies that do not have enough permits must either cut their emissions or buy spare permits from others. Companies that pollute more will require more permits and will have the option of buying them from cleaner sources. The effect is to decrease emissions at the lowest cost while allowing companies flexibility in meeting the cap.

In addition to funding adaptation, the revenue could be used to help ease the transition for low-income energy consumers to clean energies. It could also be invested in green-collar jobs and training, energy efficiency, and renewable energy production.

What should US legislation look like?

Many organizations are already advocating curbed emissions. Of course, Oxfam believes the US must actually reduce its own emissions—as stipulated by binding emission targets—and not just buy carbon offset permits from other countries, which allow it to exceed emission targets.

But beyond dealing with the cause of climate change, we must support the poor people who are dealing with its current and worsening effects. Oxfam is calling on Congress to create legislation that accomplishes the following:

• Generates new and additional financing for international adaptation.
• Builds the climate resiliency of the poorest, most vulnerable households in the US, particularly coastal communities in the Southeast. This would include the creation of green jobs for coastal communities in the Southeast and other economically depressed areas of the US.
• Provides for support of emission reductions in developing countries through the financing and transfer of clean energy technology and the protection of the world's forests.

Federal legislation should provide a framework that helps the US influence global negotiations on climate change. If the US agrees to not only reduce our own emissions but help fund adaptation efforts abroad, we could strengthen our relationships—and reputation—abroad.

Where do the global negotiations on climate change stand?

The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was signed in 1992, followed by the Kyoto Protocol in 1997. These agreements are forward-looking, international, legal instruments on which we must build in order to prevent catastrophic shocks to our climate. The Kyoto Protocol's first commitment phase ends in 2012, so negotiations for the post-2012 deal must be completed by the end of 2009 in order to avoid a gap between the commitment periods of the Kyoto Protocol, as it will take considerable time to ratify the agreement.

For poor people, who are already feeling the impacts of climate change and who are least equipped to face the increasing burden, the outcome of this agreement is hugely important. Their needs, interests, and voices must be at the heart of the negotiations and must be reflected in the final deal.

Oxfam calls on governments to base negotiations on these principles:

• Developed countries must massively scale up funding and technical assistance to address the immediate, serious impacts facing vulnerable communities today. Most of the resources required in poor countries—including at least $50 billion annually, according to Oxfam estimates—should come from developed countries.
• Global efforts to reduce emissions must be shared across countries, based on those nations' relative historic pollution as well as their ability to contribute resources. Emission reduction targets for developed countries as a group must be at least 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020, with a majority of those reductions taking place in developed countries (as distinct from developed countries buying up carbon offsets from other countries, which allow them to pollute more). This would help us avoid huge shocks to our water resources, food production, sea levels, and ecosystems.
• The new deal must include significant financial and technological support from developed to developing countries. Without this support, developing countries will have a difficult time reducing their own emissions.

How does Oxfam's campaign help poor and vulnerable communities in the US?

Just as Oxfam's global analysis shows that poor countries contribute the least to the causes of climate change yet bear the brunt of its negative impacts, so, too, do poor communities in the US. Their greenhouse gas emissions are minimal, while their "social vulnerability"--the social, economic, demographic, and housing characteristics that influence a community's ability to respond to, cope with, recover from, and adapt to environmental hazards—reveals enormous deficiencies. Most often, the socially vulnerable are poor and people of color.

Oxfam America's domestic program targets the Southeast, the poorest of all regions of the country. In fact, over half of the persistently poor counties in the US are in the 11 southern states. While the Jim Crowe segregation laws and practices have been overcome through the civil rights struggle, institutional racism and exclusion continue to deny opportunities and access and largely account for the great disparities of wealth and power between blacks and whites. In recent years, the South has experienced a rapid influx of Latino immigrants, who, fleeing their own countries' poverty, now make up significant portions of the working poor. It is the poor who score the lowest on the social vulnerability index, lacking the assets, skills, and resources to respond and adapt to disasters and major social and economic changes, such as those caused by climate change. Within the Southeast, the Gulf Coast has a larger share of poor families compared with the Atlantic coast, and the shoreline areas are particularly vulnerable to coastal erosion and hurricanes, which, as a result of warmer waters, are becoming more frequent and severe. Unfortunately, the Southeast is the least active region in terms of responding to climate issues, creating both challenges and opportunities.

Oxfam America's focus on community resilience domestically is an important element of our Climate Change campaign. It demonstrates the need for federal policy change at home and the means for implementing new policies at regional, state, and local levels.

Our priority issues begin with the critical need to articulate the connections between climate change impacts, disaster risk, and issues related to poverty and injustice; these issues are the focus of community leaders and activists. Low-income families, communities of color, immigrants, and tribal communities often suffer an unfair burden from the impacts of climate change. Federal policy, including legislation governing disaster response, should be targeted to ensure that communities and populations at risk are identified and that strategies are put in place to address their unique circumstances before and after disasters. Planning and implementation processes should ensure the engagement, consultation, and participation of affected communities and populations.

How does climate change affect women in particular?

Women in poor communities and countries are particularly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change: they often depend on rainfall (instead of irrigation) to water their crops; they are typically responsible for providing their household's water, food, and fuel supply; and they are less likely to have the education, opportunities, and resources they need to adapt to the impacts of climate change. In addition, women's traditional role as caretakers means they have little time for taking part in community discussions, so their perspectives and needs are often not heard.

At the same time, many women in both rich and poor countries are powerful in their roles as consumers and citizens. Many are aware of the importance of protecting the environment for future generations. Their role in the household means they have a valuable influence over their households' consumption patterns and lifestyle choices. And when women create networks and organizations, they can be a powerful force for social and political change.

Oxfam is working to educate the public about climate change and its impacts on women through our educational video "Sisters on the Planet" which chronicles how four inspirational women are fighting back against climate change—and how we can help. Learn more about Sisters on the Planet.