In fact average temperatures in this region in the first month of 2008 were generally up on those recorded for the same month over the past three decades.

If anyone still harbours doubts that global warming is already upon us, the last couple of years should have dispelled them pretty effectively. Even the most conservative meteorologists admit it and the outlook is for more of the same as the prevailing winds switch to easterlies, blowing in from Africa, displacing the friendlier, moisture-filled trade winds.

The island’s hard-pressed farmers are still hoping for prolonged precipitations somewhere along the line before the end of winter to replenish reservoirs and irrigation tanks. Politicians, meanwhile, are at last facing up to facts and have put their heads together to come up with a strategy to cope with the coming impact of climate change in the islands.

At long last they appear to have taken the message of the scientific and farming communities on board and admitted an urgent response is required. The result, to be unveiled this month, is a white paper entitled Estrategia de Lucha Contra el Cambio Climático.

And a man who knows a thing or two about the probable shape of things to come is Faustino García Márquez, who runs something called the Sustainable Development and Climate Change Response Agency which has helped in formulating the proposals set out in the document.
He warns of economic sacrifices ahead if society is to rise to the challenges the new world weather order will impose on the archipelago, starting with health issues.

There will, he said, be a dramatic increase in allergies and heart disease and it will not be enough for the public health system to simply muddle through and get by: the necessary infrastructure must be in place before climate change really begins to bite. More winds off the desert will mean more respiratory problems, more dust allergies.

Adaptation will be all and to that end urgent research must be carried out to produce climate “maps  which take into account the vast differences in micro-climate and environment found in each island to enable long-term planning strategies.

And planning for an uncertain future is what the administration should have been doing since the world woke up to the coming global warming crisis, he said.
As to the Canary throw-away society, it’s time for a radical, uncomfortable change. People have to pass from the abstract global concerns of drowning polar bears, he said, and  realize they can’t allow themselves the luxury of a second home or another car – especially in a region where 28% of greenhouse gases come from road traffic.

A firm believer in the carrot and stick approach, Sr García says people must be encouraged to change by seeing that altering their habits will benefit them financially and understanding that climate change needn’t only signify sacrifice but can also represent an opportunity to advance towards a more environmentally and economically balanced society.

“Now is the moment to take advantage of the doors that are opening and invest in research into renewables, preventative medicine and hospital infrastructure.
“Climate change will present the archipelago with the chance to become the technological bridge from Europe to Africa, the Americas and Asia,  he said, putting a positive spin on what might otherwise be viewed as a grim scenario of rising temperatures.

The key here, as elsewhere, must be to reduce uncertainty about future climate change and improve the ability to predict what could happen and when. Politicians, notoriously unable to look beyond the next four or five years, are now having to adjust their term-to-term tunnel vision and evaluate possible impacts on many climate-affected sectors which include agriculture, water resources, energy resources, forest management, transportation, fisheries, tourism and public health.

Just what the regional government climate change strategy dossier contains is still firmly under wraps as this edition goes to press, but perhaps we got a hint of its tone last week when regional president Paulino Rivero met with farmers and scientists in La Palma and on several occasions throughout his visit to the island repeated, mantra-like, his belief that what the region needs is “more talent and less concrete .
Mantras are all very fine. But words must be backed up by tough action and far-sighted policies.

We can only hope that the Estrategia de Lucha Contra el Cambio Climático contains some bold ones to steer the archipelago through the rising global waters of the uncertain meteorological future.