Panel: Climate Change Will Hurt Africa

A herd of elephants walk backdropped by Mt. Kilimanjaro in Amboseli game park in Kenya in this May 21, 2006 file photo. Global warming isn't just a matter of melting ice bergs and polar bears chasing after them. It's also Lake Chad drying up, the glaciers of Mt. Kilimanjaro disappearing, increasing extreme weather patterns, conflict, and hungry people throughout Africa. According to a recent landmark effort to assess the risks of global warming, Africa, by far the lowest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, is projected to be among the regions hardest hit by environmental change. (AP Photo/Karel Prinsloo, file) (Karel Prinsloo - AP)

Because greenhouse-gas levels in the atmosphere are already high, steps taken now won't have results until 2050, scientists estimate.

"We've got to start now and reap the benefit in the second half of the century," said Dr. Bruce Hewitson, a coordinating lead author for the report's regional projections chapter. "If we don't ... it just makes the second half of the century that much worse."

This isn't to cast Africa as a continent of victims, though. Africans can move toward solar energy, hydroelectric power, protect forests, put carbon scrubbers on existing smokestacks and take other steps to adapt, mitigate the effects of warming, and even set an example for the world.

"Why should Africa sit with coal technology, which has created pollution ... why not a green path," said Midgely. "I think, let's get the whole world onto a greener development path, because when you create those green energy markets, the whole thing starts to snowball."

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Associated Press writers Seth Borenstein in Washington and Michael Casey in Bangkok, Thailand contributed to this report.

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On the Net:

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change: http://www.ipcc.ch