Author: kt6091a

The debate or controversy I am writing about is how the COVID-19 pandemic has effected climate change and further improvements that can be done to reduce damage to the environment. Due to the current virus outbreak, people are staying inside and the environment has been improving, but there needs to be a long term solution to overcome climate change by the time we return to our daily routines.

The debate in this topic is whether or not COVID-19 has opened more peoples’ eyes to the effect we as humans had on climate change, and their plan to tackle it now seeing the direct results. Will there be a long term solution to stopping climate change, or was it a temporary fix?

In this article, the author discusses that due to the slowdown of humans, there has been a decrease in air pollution. ahttps://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2020/04/coronavirus-pandemic-earth-pollution-noise/609316/

In this article, the European Union states that they have seen current decreases in greenhouse gases and air quality has gone up. Seeing these drastic changes, the EU environment chief states that they have to come up with a future plan that is sustainable and works well with a sustainable economy that is in the best interest of both earth and the people. https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/04/1061082

In this article, the author addresses the economy that has possibly impacted carbon dioxide emissions, and what we can do from here to make sure that it remains low. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/5-ways-the-economic-upheaval-of-coronavirus-may-impact-co2-emissions/

In this debate I think/believe/argue that people will start to see and acknowledge that it is time to address the issue of climate change. It has been put on the back burner for too long, and now is the best time to think of new ways and practices to keep carbon emissions low as well as reducing pollution to end climate change.

My position is important because it helps us understand/know that climate change is as serious of an issue as the newest virus pandemic and society has to come together to take charge and create longterm sustainable solutions to overcome climate change.

Throughout the op-ed, the author Christopher Ketcham expressed his opinion of the current reduction of air pollution due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Due to the virus outbreak, drastic drops of tourism and travel have occurred which leads to the current decline of transportation cutbacks that contributes to the reduction of massive amounts of air pollution.

I can tell this is an op-ed article due to the fact that the author is trying to persuade and convince their readers about the effects of carbon emissions has on climate change and how this is the first time we as a society, can take a step back and think about how this will affect our future. For example, he states “The coronavirus may finally cause us to see air travel for what it is, a fuse burning in the climate bomb,” (Ketcham). In this article, he really voices his own opinion and adds his own thoughts that are backed up with statistics which is different than other articles because he is trying to convince the reader to think more about how we can cut back on traveling to save our country’s planet. He also states “It is a world of less travel, less consumption, one not pathogen-determined but instead created by our own collective self-restraint, humility and altruism. If we learn from the coronavirus, generations to come will thank us,” (Ketcham). At the end of the op-ed, he states his opinion about how the coronavirus has allowed us to think about our future and how we can control climate change after the outbreak of the virus settles. This is an eye-opener for the future of our society to think about future acts we can practice to eliminate climate change.

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2020-03-14/coronavirus-travel-ban-air-travel-climate-change-carbon-emissions

1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-v3uqD1hWGE

This TedTalk talks about how trading between different countries is not really about trade and the foundation that we set up are corrupt. 

2. https://www.belfercenter.org/publication/global-environmental-policy-and-global-trade-policy

This article talks about the acts countries are trying to make to decrease greenhouse gas admissions but it violates rules of WTO. This shows how new regulations and progress towards eliminating carbon emissions need to be placed. 

3. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/04/climate/companies-climate-change-financial-impact.html

Due to extreme and drastic changes in climate change, an estimate of trillion dollars will be at stake. The changes in extreme weather could possibly disrupt their supply chains or stricter climate regulations that could hurt the value of coal, oil, and gas investments. 

Within the last decade, records report that it was the warmest temperatures on earth. The rise in natural disasters worldwide is a direct result of climate change. The countries that are affected most by natural disasters are the less developed countries that are struggling to support and grow their economy. In 2018, a drought hit South Africa and left 45 million people in need in 14 countries. Due to the drought that they experienced, farmers could not and still cannot produce and grow crops which results in a rise in the price of foods and leaves millions of people in hunger. This drought began in late October of 2018 and is still occurring to this day. Within the past year, there was a little rainfall, but it was not enough to grow enough crops to produce enough food supply for everyone in need.

As seen in the pictures above, South African countries suffer their worst drought in history. 

While other countries who are more economically stable than these 14 countries that are being affected by this drought, did a poor job in trying to manage how to help them adapt and get them back on their feet. The UN Emergency Relief Coordinator stated that “We need to move to a system where we act much earlier on the warning signs of drought and hunger so that we can cut response times and costs, and reduce deaths and human suffering”. The solution to seeing the extreme damages of climate change is to have international organizations ban together to support those countries in need. I am studying International Business and this issue addresses how little international business and organizations are acting on helping countries that are most affected by climate change. Measures could have been made prior to the situation getting this far. This critique has world organizations at fault in their failure to help the situation before it got to this extent. Climate change is not one country’s issue, rather it is affecting all of us in society. A solution to preventing this from happening again would have world organizations teams that specifically look into every case and try to find a plan that adapts to the situation while trying to correct and limit further damages to the earth.

https://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/analysis/2019/06/10/drought-africa-2019-45-million-in-need