Covid-19 and the climate crisis are part of the same battle | Jeffrey Frankel

To survive the challenges we must reinforce respect for science and nature, sensible public policy and the interconnected world

From early on in the Covid-19 pandemic, a common refrain has been, At least maybe now we will get serious about addressing climate change." One can certainly see the logic behind this thinking. The terrible toll the pandemic has taken should remind us of the importance of three things that are also necessary to tackle global warming: science, public policy, and international cooperation.

We should therefore listen to the scientists who have been warning for decades that unchecked greenhouse-gas emissions would have severe environmental consequences. The fact that some of these consequences - including wildfires, cyclones, and even a plague of locusts in Africa - have dramatically appeared in the same year as Covid-19 would seem to reinforce the message.

In May 2019, the most comprehensive study of life on Earth ever undertaken was released by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). The report was compiled from more than 1,500 academic papers and reports from indigenous groups. The overall message is that the world's life support systems, on which humans depend, are in trouble. Remedies are possible, but they require urgent, transformative action because policies until now have failed to halt the tide of human-made extinctions. The authors hope the mega-report will guide policymakers and generate public discussion on biodiversity (including wildlife, food crops, livestock and ecosystems) in the same way that the climate debate is shaped by reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

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