WWF report cites extreme weather pattern on Yangtze

Rising temperatures because of carbon emissions over the coming decades are to create storms, floods, and other extreme weather patterns across China's Yangtze River basin, a new report said.

While ecosystems along China's longest river are threatened by climate change, now it is not too late to save them if proper mitigation measures are taken, said the report issued Tuesday by the environmental group WWF, the Associated Press reported.

In the past two decades, temperatures in the Yangtze region have risen by an average of 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit (or 1 degree Celsius), causing a spike in flooding, heat waves and drought, said the report, the largest assessment yet on the impact of global warming on the Yangtze basin area, where some 400 million people dwell.

Data collected from 147 monitoring stations along the1.8 million-square-kilometer basin area showed temperatures rose by 0.59 degrees Fahrenheit (0.33 degrees Celsius) during the 1990s.

"Extreme climate events such as storms and drought disasters will increase as climate change continues to alter our planet," said Xu Ming, the lead researcher on the report, which included expert contributions from the China Academy of Sciences, the China Meteorological Administration and other academic institutions.

Over the next 50 years, if nothing is done, temperatures will continue to climb by an average of 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit (1.5 degrees Celsius) to 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius), which will only increase the frequency of natural disasters, the WWF report warned.

The consequences of global warming are particularly dire for a region that contributes 35 percent of the nation's total grain production and 41 percent of China's gross domestic product. The region, which cuts across the length of China, is also home to rare and endangered species such as the giant panda and the Yangtze dolphin.

Crops such as corn, winter wheat and rice will see clear drops in production, with the rice harvest alone dipping between 9 percent and 41 percent by the end of the century, if no action is taken, the report said. Natural habitat such as grasslands and wetlands have receded steadily in recent years, while rising sea levels triggered by global warming will make coastal cities such as Shanghai more vulnerable.

By People's Daily Online