It’s on the horizon. It is a news item which has yet to be written. It concerns cat welfare, dog welfare and our welfare. It concerns everything. It is the setback to the fight against climate change brought about by, firstly, Covid and now the Ukraine invasion.
For me, these two disasters have setback efforts to curb global warming. And they’ve been set back to the point where the world has less than 10 years to avert climate change catastrophe according to a new report.
The cost of Covid to the world’s countries and economies has been estimated at around $13 trillion according to the IMF.
It is going to be very expensive to curb global warming. It means adjusting manufacturing and the way we live. It requires fundamental change and the biggest barrier is the expense of it all. Covid sucked a lot of money out of the world economies and therefore governments are less likely to spend the money to curb global warming. Or they don’t have the money to do it anyway. And where there are prioritisations to be made animal welfare is normally at the bottom of the pile.
Britain borrowed £400 billion. The national debt is gargantuan at around 100% of GDP. With inflation climbing, the interest payments on this debt have risen sharply. There is less available funding for welfare. Although inflation reduces the debt, that’s a long-term issue. Climate change is an immediate and pressing catastrophe in the making.
Quickly following on from Covid we have Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. A catastrophe currently being played out with disastrous consequences for animal welfare and of course for humans. All because one man has his own pipe dreams based upon a distorted sense of reality and a psychopathic desire to achieve them.
The Ukraine invasion is also going to be very expensive for the world because it damages world trade and pushes up prices. And we’ll have to repair Ukraine’ building and infrastructure ($140 billion and climbing). China wants the Ukraine war to stop as it damages the world economy but they want to support Russia at the same time. For example, Ukraine is a massive wheat producer. The price of bread and other grain-based products such pet food is raising. That’s a minor thing but overall, the Ukraine war will negatively impact economies.
It may end up worse than that because I’ve just read that the Russian deputy ambassador to the UN said that Russia might use nuclear bombs if they feel that Russia is threatened by the NATO. If there is an ‘existential threat’ to Russia, Putin will push the big red button, he said. It’s that close and if that happens it’s game over for human and animal welfare.
But I’m more interested right now in the money aspect of maintaining and improving animal welfare. There is surging inflation post-Covid and prices are going to be pushed up further by the Ukraine invasion. When you push up prices there is less money in the pocket. This must inevitably lead to a lowering in expectations, desires and commitment towards animal welfare because, as mentioned, this is not a top priority for governments worldwide.
It is reported that carbon dioxide emissions increased by almost 5% last year. This is the post-Covid rush to kickstart economies. This means that the world now has a 67% chance of reaching 1.5°C of global warming over a pre-industrial levels within 10 years according to a new study published in the journal Nature Reviews Earth and Environment.
The rebound in economies after Covid has caused this. The limit on global warming to 1.5°C above preindustrial levels has been set by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Warming beyond this threshold could set devastating events in motion, triggering further warming which would be out of control.
Humankind has taken their eye off the global warming ball because of Ukraine, because of Putin. The money has run out. How are we going to afford to pay for the changes needed in our lifestyle to protect the world against global warming for generations to come?
Britain has recently talked about putting back a range of plans to curb global warming because of financial pressures. It looks bad.
