From the desert to the sea: Bahamas, Botswana unite in climate vulnerability

Mbongeni Mguni | Thursday April 4, 2024 13:56

The two countries could not be more far removed from each. One is an expansive nation of 3,000 islands in the Atlantic Ocean, while the other is a semi-arid, landlocked country covered 70% by desert.

And yet both countries are amongst nations most vulnerable to the intensifying effects of climate change, an existential crisis for both.

Each year, leaders from Botswana attend the global climate talks formally known as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) where nations most responsible for the climate threats facing the world, make commitments to reduce pollution and increase funding for the world’s most vulnerable countries.

And each year, both countries return to base to endure the harsh reality that the world is moving far too slowly, too reluctantly to stave off the worst effects of changing climate.

Batswana this season have endured heatwaves since summer began in October, decimating crops while also killing livestock and wildlife. Botswana is geographically disadvantaged because it sits roughly in the middle of a landmass surrounded by large water bodies, the Atlantic and the Indian Ocean. Local Met Services Department officials have said the oceans have more (heat) memory than land and take a long time to release heat back. Their 50 to 100-year projections show sharply increasing temperatures and lower rainfall.

Bahamas Prime Minister, Philip Davis, says the crisis facing the island nation is even more treacherous.

“I’m an ocean state with several hundred islands spread over 400,000 square miles of water,” he said in an exclusive interview during his recent state visit.

“My landmass, just the sand, is less than three metres above sea level and the make-up of my landmass is limestone, so I’m not only concerned about rising seas.

“If nothing happens, my people will very soon be climate refugees.”

A perusal of The Bahamas government’s official digital channels shows that rising seas and the threat of islands disappearing, is not the only manifestation of climate change for the country. The digital channels including social media, dedicate a lot of time to warning citizens about incoming hurricanes and similar harmful weather patterns.

While Botswana spends hundreds of millions of Pula on subsidies for farmers and drought relief annually, Davis explains how climate change hits The Bahamas’ fiscus.

“Small countries like mine are vulnerable and I can tell you that the last hurricane we had cost my country $3.4 billion in losses when my annual budget revenue is under $3 billion.

“That one hurricane took my island for three days and the loss and damage was over $3 billion. “You see the challenges we have.”

The crisis caused by climate change for both countries is only made worse by the bitter, cruel irony that both nations are also amongst the lowest contributors to global carbon emissions. The Bahamas actually contributes to the reduction of global carbon emissions and in fact, scientists have discovered that the islands have huge deposits of seagrass which are almost five to seven times more potent in its absorption of carbon than the Amazon forest.

Meanwhile, getting the nations that actually contribute more to the climate crisis to cut back on their emissions, has proved akin to squeezing blood from a rock. Davis reflects somberly when asked whether he believes the developed world is doing its part to rein in climate change. He picks his words carefully, throwing a phrase out, then retracting it and rephrasing it.

“I don’t believe developed nations are doing enough on climate change and you sometimes have to question their actions when you try to align them with what they say.

“Their words and actions do not align at all.

“For example, last year, just in the US, they were happy that they re-entered the Paris Agreement because they had withdrawn and I must admit that the present leadership has been very vocal and very engaged on the subject matter.

“But then in October last year, authorisation was given for the construction of an oil refinery to produce 269,000 barrels of oil a day.

“Now that doesn’t line up with what they say and I haven’t heard an explanation yet as to how that is still going to still align.

“So you have to ask, what does that signal to me? Me who is on the frontline of the threats of climate change; what does that say to me?

“The UK, around the same time, gave permission for the development of a huge oil field in the Midlands and again what does that tell you when it comes to what they are saying?”

As he selects his words, he is emphatic that his comments should not be read as accusing other nations of hypocrisy.

“You know, let me not say that, but let’s put it this way.

“Let’s put the question another way.

“The question probably is why is progress not being made and why are countries doing what they are doing, which as I said, is contrary to what their stated goal is? That might be better question. “It’s not political will that’s retarding progress; it’s political change because new leaders come onto the scene with different attitudes and different views and very often it doesn’t align.

“That answer came to me when I went to COP26 in Glasgow which was my first global meeting and I knew that President Trump had withdrawn from the Paris Agreement.

“President Biden comes in and he is back on board with COP but we have already lost four years. “What that administration has to do to reverse what they had done, would it be sufficient to mitigate all the time that had been lost?

“So is that hypocrisy? I hear it and I could say it, but I try to be an optimist in these things and give countries the best of the doubt because I understand some political realities that influence decision-making and that’s why I would not go that far, at this time.”

As The Bahamas and Botswana continue to cooperate on multiple fronts, the two countries have pledged to support each other on global various platforms. Climate change will be one of those where, though small on their own, their joint voices could prove loud enough to catch the world’s attention.

Lives quite literally depend on it.