Climate change will exacerbate the difference between the richest countries and the poorest countries, according to a new report published in the journal Nature Climate Change.
The study found that climate change will push natural resources toward Earth’s pole and since wealthier countries tend to prioritize resource management, these countries are positioned to reap any potential climate change related rewards.
“What we find is that natural resources like fish are being pushed around by climate change, and that changes who gets access to them,” Malin Pinsky, professor of ecology & evolution at Rutgers University, said in a news release.
The team noted that fish, plants, trees, and other species essential to society are moving out of the temperate zones and in the direction of the poles as global temperatures increase. Researchers also said “inclusive wealth” is the amount of a community’s capital assets – like natural assets and human health – in addition to developed assets like roads, buildings, and industrial facilities. Because climate transformations erratically from place to place, normal assets migrate or reproduce erratically.
How did they come to this conclusion?
To reach their conclusion, the study team used information Pinsky developed in his research of fish migration and put that data into a mathematical algorithm. The study also considered two fictional fishing communities: Northport and Southport. The team was able to show the connection between the shifting of resources and the shifting of wealth due to climate change.
“We tend to think of climate change as just a problem of physics and biology,” Pinsky saod. “But people react to climate change as well, and at the moment we don’t have a good understanding for the impacts of human behavior on natural resources affected by climate change.”
In another recent study, researchers found climate change may affect international air travel. Published in Environmental Research Letters journal, the study found a faster jet stream caused by climate change winds will delay transatlantic flights, resulting in the loss of countless hours and millions of dollars in jet fuel.
“The aviation industry is facing pressure to reduce its environmental impacts, but this study shows a new way in which aviation is itself susceptible to the effects of climate change,” study author Paul Williams, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Reading in the United Kingdom, told The Guardian.
—–
Featured image: Migratory fish contribute heavily to this phenomenon. Image credit: Thinkstock
Comments