World Bank wants urgent climate action in Latin America, Caribbean to accelerate transition to resilient, low-carbon economies

(The World Bank Press Release) A new World Bank report calls on countries in the region to take urgent action to help reduce the impacts of climate change and set a path for the transition to low-carbon economies.

According to the report, A Roadmap for Climate Action in Latin America and the Caribbean 2021-2025, climate-related disasters such as hurricanes, droughts, fires, and floods are becoming increasingly frequent and intense in the region and are the cause of enormous economic losses. Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) is among the regions most vulnerable to the destructive power of such events, with annual costs due to disruptions in energy and transport infrastructure equivalent to 1 percent of regional GDP and up to 2 percent in some Central American countries.

Furthermore, climate change is expected to have negative impacts on productivity and harvests in several countries in the region. This could exacerbate acute food insecurity, which increased rapidly during the COVID-19 pandemic to affect more than 16 million people across the region, with many families at risk in 2022 due to higher inflation and food prices. Without action, by 2030, up to 5.8 million people could fall into extreme poverty as a result of climate change, and by 2050 over 17 million people could be forced to leave their homes to escape climate impacts.

Read more at: The World Bank

Source: CARICOM TODAY