Press Releases

Climate Witnesses call on G8 for action

02 Jul 2008
Over the years, concerned Climate Witnesses have come to WWF to share their observations. Here are some of the climate change impacts people are already experiencing in G8 countries:

Ruth Hartwig-Kruse, Germany
Ruth Hartwig-Kruse’s family has been running a farm on the small island Nordstrandischmoor off the German coast for 290 years. She says: “Our island is extremely vulnerable to rising sea levels, and in recent years the sea has come as close as three meters to our home during storms. This makes life on our island increasingly difficult, and if sea level rise and storm intensities get worse, I doubt that the next generation will have a safe future here.”
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Vlad Kavry, Russia
The story of hunter Vlad Kavry from the Russian Far East is also one of life-threatening climate impacts: “During the last few winters a lot more walrus and polar bears came ashore near our village. The bears depend on sea ice to get to their prey, and the walrus use the ice to rest on, but with rising temperatures and decreasing sea ice their habitat is shrinking. We work to manage the threat by keeping these animals away from our villages without hurting them.”
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Bob Smith, Canada
82-year-old Bob Smith from Canada has informed WWF about warmer winters in Southern Alberta: “I am a regular hiker and I have noticed a significant decline in the glaciers of the Canadian Rocky Mountains, especially the Athabaska, Illecillewaet, and Asulkan glaciers. To make things worse, the warmer weather is also causing a pine bark beetle infestation that is killing our local forests.”
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Neil Smith, Scotland, UK
The big meltdown has also started in Europe, as Neil Smith reports from the Scottish Highlands, where he has been an ice climber for 27 years: “During the mid 80s great low lying water falls in Scotland were frozen solid, but since the mid 90s these areas have yielded little ice climbing. I would hate to see Scottish ice climbing come to an end, but it looks like a real possibility and within a relatively short time period.”
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Andrea Fabellini, France
Andrea Fabellini has observed changes of a similar magnitude in the area around the Mont Blanc, France’s highest mountain: “We have experienced a general decline of snowfall. Small resorts at the foot of the alpine valleys never opened last winter, and they have stopped maintaining the vast majority of ski lifts and cable cars below 2000 meters.”
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Burr Morse, USA
Burr Morse is a farmer from the United States struggling to cope with the changes: “I think that we sugar farmers are the fussiest farmers in the world about the weather we need, the perfect weather with freezing nights and warmer days for the maple sap to run. In the last 20 years we have had a number of bad seasons and most of those I would attribute to temperature that is a little too warm. I worry about future decline of maple trees in this part of North America where maple sugaring has been so important to our way of life for so long.”
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Katsuo Sasaki, Japan
Katsuo Sasaki from Japan’s high-quality rice producing area in Miyagi Province confirms the challenges: “During the last ten years the quality of rice has been degrading, because the rice grains have been opacified due to extreme summer weather. The grains have also been damaged by stinkbugs. Such rice cannot be sold, because it loses its market value. I am concerned that we will no longer be able to produce high-quality rice, if the warming progresses at the current pace. It might become impossible for rice to adapt to the changes in the environment.”
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Giuseppe Miranti, Italy
Beekeeper Giuseppe Miranti from Italy also knows this struggle from personal experience: “Warmer temperatures make flowers bloom at unusual times, and the bees change their behavior. The level of activity in the apiary has slowed down drastically. Over the centuries bees have instinctively learnt to adapt to changes in their natural environment, but I doubt that they will we able to adapt to man-made climate change. It scares me, because Albert Einstein once said that if the honey bee ever disappeared, mankind would only survive a few years beyond it.”
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These Climate Witnesses do what they can to deal with the impacts of climate change, and to become leaders in their local communities when it comes to changing lifestyles in order to reduce the carbon footprints of individuals. However, in terms of the big changes we need to see at global level, they rely on the G8 Heads of States and Governments to show leadership and make the necessary decisions.

For more Climate Witness stories please go to: http://www.panda.org/climatewitness/stories