Report says region’s GDP will fall with no climate deal

A major impact of global warming for the Caribbean is sea level rise (Photo: PriceOfOil.org)

COPENHAGEN, Denmark, December 17, 2009 – If no international agreement is reached to mitigate the effects of climate change the cost for Latin America and the Caribbean could be equivalent to 137 percent of the region's current Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by the end of this century.

The prediction is made in the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean’s (ECLAC) report ‘Economics of Climate Change in Latin America and the Caribbean’ which was presented this week during a side event of Climate Change Conference taking place in Copenhagen.

The study projects that without international mitigation efforts, the region could suffer important losses in agriculture and biodiversity, strong pressures on infrastructure and a growing intensity of extreme weather events.

The report forecasts that without international mitigation actions, by the year 2100, the region could suffer important losses in agriculture and biodiversity, strong pressures on infrastructure and a growing intensity of natural disasters. These accumulated losses would represent a significant proportion of current GDP, it said.

According to the study, climate variations and extreme weather events will mean that by 2100, the cost of climatic disasters will increase from an annual average of US$8.6 billion (2000-2008) to a maximum possible of almost US$250 billion.

Although Latin America and the Caribbean is the second region in the world with the lowest greenhouse gas emissions after Africa, it is suffering the effects of global warming more than any other, says the report.

The study said this urgently demands technological and financial support from developed countries for the region's efforts of adaptation and mitigation.

The report was prepared by ECLAC with the collaboration of the governments of Germany, Denmark, Spain and the United Kingdom, as well as the European Union, the Inter American Development Bank (IDB), the Global Mechanism of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification, and a broad network of academic and research institutions.