{"id":343443,"date":"2024-09-17T07:51:32","date_gmt":"2024-09-17T05:51:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=343443"},"modified":"2024-09-17T07:51:34","modified_gmt":"2024-09-17T05:51:34","slug":"stick-to-the-weather-world-meteorological-organization-africas-gdp-is-not-declining","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=343443","title":{"rendered":"Stick to the Weather, World Meteorological Organization, Africa\u2019s GDP Is Not Declining"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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From ClimateRealism<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By H. Sterling Burnett<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Associated Press (AP) posted a story describing a study by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) which claims climate change is costing Africa as much as 5 percent of its GDP. Data show this is false. Extreme weather has not become more frequent or severe in Africa, and GDP in the different African regions and particular countries cited by the WMO and discussed in the AP story has grown substantially during recent period of climate change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Monika Pronczuk, the writer of the AP story, \u201cAfrican nations are losing up to 5% of their GDP per year with climate change, a new report says,<\/a>\u201d uncritically parrots the WMO\u2019s claims that \u201cAfrican nations are losing up to 5% of their GDP every year as they bear a heavier burden than the rest of the world from climate change.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201c\u2018Over the past 60 years, Africa has observed a warming trend that has become more rapid than the global average,\u2019 said WMO Secretary-General Celeste Saulo, warning that it is affecting everything from food security to public health to peace,\u201d wrote Pronczuck.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She should have checked the data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Climate Realism<\/em> has discussed repeatedly, hard data from the United Nations and other government and international agencies refute any claims that climate change is making Africa\u2019s weather worse or causing food insecurity. The latter claim has been debunked in repeated Climate Realism<\/em> articles, here<\/a>, here<\/a>, and here<\/a>, for example, which show that crop yields and production across the continent, except in areas of civil and cross border strife driven by religious and political conflicts, have regularly set records amid modest climate change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Climate Realism<\/em> has also shown that recent extreme weather events have not, in fact, been unusual in Africa\u2019s history nor have they been more severe in recent decades, here<\/a>, here<\/a>, and here<\/a>, for instance. In the few countries where food production has been hampered and economic growth has declined across multiple years in Africa, research shows it is consistently due to political strife, from civil wars<\/a>, cross border conflicts<\/a>, or political corruption<\/a>. Climate change has not been a factor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The main thrust of the WMO report is that because climate change has caused increasingly severe weather, it has also resulted in a GDP decline with African countries having to spend a disproportionate percentage of their incomes mitigating climate change. But since the former is false, the latter is as well. And, indeed, data consistently show substantial GDP growth across the period of recent climate change in the regions and countries discussed in the AP story, and one would presume the WMO report. In fact, the growth rate there has been at or above the world\u2019s average GDP growth rate as a whole. For instance:<\/p>\n\n\n\n