A CLIMATE OF PEACE ON THE MEDITERRANEAN
doubtless
climate change is a global problem
but its impact and its severity varies a
lot from one place to the other
after the arctic the mediterranean is
the fastest warming
region in the world it warms 20 percent
faster
than the global average and this doesn’t
promise anything good
for us all a recent scientific report
sponsored by the union for the
mediterranean
to which more than 680 scientists from
all over the mediterranean contributed
tells us that the future
could be difficult for instance it
forecasts
heavier storms mega fires
but also an increase of people
who will be thirsty 250 million
people in a few years could be more to
scarcity
or the level of the mediterranean could
increase up to one meter before the end
of the century
and 25 centimeters in just a few years a
higher level of water of 25 centimeters
doesn’t scare
anyone but only if we forget that the
problem is not only
with the vulnerable coastal cities like
our precious venice
it is with the lands surrounding the
mediterranean
25 centimeters more salty water entering
the lands
will sterilize those lands and we cannot
forget that 42 percent of the world
population lives around the coast
and that agricultural production is
concentrated around the coast
just imagine 25 more centimeters could
salinize the delta of the nile
and jeopardize the agriculture of a
country that has
more or less 100 million
people this severe impacts become
more scary because they overlap a
situation which is characterized by
a high difference a high asymmetry a
situation in which there are strong
communities
and weak communities a good portrait
of these differences is given by the
international commerce in our area
around the mediterranean
of old international exchanges ninety
percent
takes place among north rim countries
nine percent between north rim and south
stream countries
and only 0.9 percent among
south rim countries it tells us why
if we do not take measures
to fight climate change and to adapt to
it
this crazy climate could become a wind
of war
over the mediterranean so what do we
have to do do we have to prepare to
fight
it would be the most stupid thing to do
there is another solution
and it is science that points it out
both
harder sciences like physics and more
social sciences
like economy tell us one
fundamental truth that in face of a
change
of such speed and of such
width there is not one single community
not one single country even the
strongest
who will be able to face it on its own
we need each other for instance
to fight climate change we need new
technologies
but what technologies up here in the
north technology reminds us of machines
of devices but
we cannot forget that the problem that
europe will have to face
is aridity and the people who have
experienced
thousands years experience in facing
aridity are in the south for instance
we can build modern fridges
but down there in the south along the
silk road
there are buildings cone-shaped
buildings called the yak chal
that have been keeping an inner
temperature up to -4
to preserve the merchandises
along the route and again
if we think about irrigation up here in
the north yes
we can devise wonderful computers but
down there in the south in persia for
thousands of years
they have grown gardens in the desert
thanks to canals that
are dug under the sand and that capture
moisture
from the atmosphere and the soil they’re
called the
cannot equally how many diseases do we
cause to ourselves
how much discomfort with what we call
air conditioning
whereas in the middle of the desert
there are houses
that have a very nice temperature inside
while outside is maybe 50 degrees due to
a technology called
the wind towers that capture the winds
but even when it gets to technology as
we know it today
industrial advanced technology we just
cannot
leave each one on its own imagine
solar you can do solar panels wherever
you want
but the real sun is in the south
and so we need interconnections among
the two shores
and inside the shores the same thing
applies for wind
you can build windmills everywhere but
the really strong wind
is in the balkans their production
becomes useful to everyone
even nature tells us that we cannot just
face it on our own
in the past 10 years roughly
the agricultural and forestry
communities
started to cooperate more and more
between the two shores of the
mediterranean and it was spontaneous
without any intervention by governments
why
because these communities are aware of
one thing that puts us together
there are some species that are lively
and productive now in the south
adapted to drought that must be
preserved because
we have to feed those people but those
same species
will maybe save our agricultures and our
economies
in the future so what is climate change
telling us over the mediterranean
there is one solution and it is not only
a solution to climate change
you see our sea has been the cradle of
civilizations but it has never been
a sea of complete peace a lot of
conflicts
the root of which are those differences
that i mentioned
before well if in fighting climate
change
we conceive a new economy one which is
based on the principle that i need you
and not on the principle that i am
competing with you then
while tackling climate change we come to
on the only sensible solution
which is called peace over the
mediterranean climate change has one
solution
peace
you