Conflict Increasing with Extreme Weather

It makes sense to me that environmental degradation would cause conflict to occur within countries. In times of desperation, people will do what they can or what they have to, to survive. Like in Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, if the first and most basic level of food, water, and shelter is not achieved, people cannot move forward onto morality, which is in the last level. People struggling to survive can’t afford to think morally, because that could lead to their death.

However, what was particularly interesting to me, was the specific weather conditions and their effect on conflict. In Tara’s presentation she explained how “one standard deviation change in climate toward warmer temperatures or more extreme rainfall increase frequency of interpersonal violence by 2.3% and of intergroup conflict by 13.2%.” I think being able to assign hard numbers to the effects of climate change on the world would help in creating and implementing a climate change policy. Often times, the reasoning for policy makers to be hesitant or against climate change policy is because of the “uncertainty” that is involved. Yes, in science there is no such thing as solid proof; we would be unable to know 100% that climate change is occurring. However, with all the evidence we have and continue to get, it is fairly certain that climate change is occurring. Yet, scientific uncertainty is heard all too often. Policy makers hold on to that tightly, since it is their strongest argument, and use it time and time again in order to resist any climate change policies that might affect industries and corporations. However, being able to provide solid numbers of what climate change is going to do to the world, might further belittle their uncertainty argument.

In Climate Change, Rainfall, and Social Conflict in Africa, by Cullen Hendrix and Idean Salehyan, they look into how deviations of the normal rainfall patterns impacts people in African communities. They conclude that armed conflict is more likely to occur when rainfall is above average. Non-violent events (protests, strikes) are more likely in the event of below average rainfall. All types of events (violent or non-violent) have a higher chance of occurring when experiencing either high or low extremes of rainfall, when compared to years with years of average rainfall.

Morality tends to go out the window when faced with water scarcity. California is currently experiencing a drought, I’d be curious to know if the problems that were seen in Africa translate over to America.

The Windup Girl and Dhaka, Bangladesh

While reading The Windup Girl, I was reminded of a project I am working on for my Capstone class this semester. The novel is set in the future in Thailand, where global warming has taken a catastrophic toll on the world. The big corporations are based in agriculture and are in complete control of food manufacturing and distribution. Often entire populations are wiped out due to rapid spreading of diseases. Granted, this is a highly dramatized version of what could happen with climate change, but much of it isn’t all that unrealistic with the growing patterns we see in the real world.

            For my Capstone final project, we were instructed to conduct research regarding the rising sea levels in major coastal cities. We were to look into what would happen to our assigned country over the next 60 years, challenges they will face, and possible solutions. Thailand was actually one of the cities assigned, however my group was assigned to Dhaka, Bangladesh. Dhaka is one of the most densely populated cities in the world with its population exceeding 15 million. It is low-lying and located near many rivers and water sources, it is very susceptible to flooding, as well as droughts, from the water not being able to be distributed properly, and ultimately wasted. With climate change brings increases in frequency and severity of storms, furthering the poor conditions that this city already experiences. Dhaka has a large percent of the population living below the poverty line, and directly along the coast. These are the people who will be the most vulnerable to what climate change will bring.

            Currently, half of the workforce works in sweatshops, usually earning around $5 a day. The city brings in money through exporting garments, textiles and other related goods. A staple in the Dhaka diet is rice, which is grown in the country. Both rice and garments or textiles, require a certain type of climate, which wouldn’t be provided with climate change. The country is politically corrupt, which only adds to the struggles. There is a transport shortage, meaning that many who need to transport their goods in order to sell them, are now out of business. And with a rice shortage becoming a real possibility, the city has to worry about lack of food, water, shelter, and land.

            This situation very much reminds me of The Windup Girl. In Dhaka, climate change is quickly eliminating large chunks of land, leaving the poor completely vulnerable and desperate to find a way to live. These people are completely at the mercy of the government to do whatever they have to do in order to survive. With markets having to shut down rice sales due to increased taxes and decreased transportation, the government is in charge of finding a way to feed the country. With the current corrupt state of the government, it is plausible for large food production corporations to have complete control over food and be in power. Also, with less arable land for agriculture and freshwater, a solution must be found to have crops that can withstand harsh weather conditions, and GMO could easily be that solution. With flooding already occurring in Dhaka, infectious diseases are on the rise, wiping out communities rapidly, similar to the plague infecting many in The Windup Girl.

            Although The Windup Girl might have seen extreme and unrealistic at times, I don’t think it is unreasonable to assume that similar problems are likely to be seen with the rising sea levels, and decreasing land mass, especially for corrupt cities.

Scarcity and Conflict

            Humans can find almost any reason to fight, but one of the most used reasons is the fighting for resources. Natural resources have always been limited in nature, whether it was game for nomadic tribes or oil for modern day countries. And just like the tribes that fought over game countries fight over oil nowadays. It is the feeling that I must always have enough for me that drives people to gather and hoard as much as possible and exclude their neighbors. This need to secure ones resources also leads to jealousy, which leads to stealing. This means that people feel the need to secure their belongings and their families from other people from trying to take them. The result of this are militias and armies that have to sole desire to expand and control the area around them.

            When people are forced to do without they often finds ways to get what they want, in the early 1930’s the USSR manufactured a scarcity of food in the Ukraine to try to regain control of the populace. Millions of people died as a result of this, and it had the opposite effect the USSR was hoping for it enraged the Ukrainians and ultimate this resentment led to the Ukraine being the deciding factor in the fall of the USSR. The resentment from the horrible genocide never left the minds of the general populace. Even though the USSR fell with very little violence, the hatred the Ukrainians felt was very real.

            One of the most contested natural resources are diamonds, they have a very high economic value and tend to only exist in small pockets throughout the world. For this reason a term has been created, a blood diamond, this refers to a diamond mined in an area of conflict or fighting. Most often this fighting is over the source of the diamonds themselves. Sierra Leone is a major source of conflict diamonds and political power often rests with the person who controls the diamond mines. In 1991 a civil war began when the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) invaded Sierra Leone, and throughout the nine-year civil war, fighting concentrated in and around the diamond districts. RUF leaders were very aware that whoever controls the diamond mines controls Sierra Leone, and profits from smuggled diamonds funded its attack. Even after a peace agreement in 1999 the fighting began again in no time, and control over the diamond mines is still at the center of the conflict. Ultimately as a result, the UN has issued a ban on nongovernmental diamonds for Sierra Leone.

            With the rapidly shifting climate that the world is currently undergoing, scarcity is going to become more common for some areas, and others will become more prosperous. The change in rainfall will make what was once very fertile land become much less so and they will not be able to support as large of a population as they were previously able to. This will lead to migrations to areas where and existing population already lives. The people that are established in the now fertile areas will be less than thrilled to accept the influx of refugees coming in. This will naturally lead to conflict as the group coming in will be marginalized, the will eventually fight against those that wish to keep them down, and the native group will fight to protect their land against the incoming masses. Scarcity is something that will more than likely never disappear and neither will the conflict that it inspires.

GMO's in The Windup Girl

            The novel The Windup Girl depicts a very dystopian future, where humans are struggling to survive, and the world is a very harsh place. In this world the main source of energy is wound up springs, and the primary source of food is provided by bioengineering firms that use genetically modified organisms (GMO’s). Throughout the book GMO’s are portrayed in a negative light, there are many plagues and diseases that are blamed on GMO’s and the rise of mutant insects the plague the world are also blamed on GMO’s. This negative depiction of GMO’s is not representative of the beneficial potential that GMO’s actually contain. GMO’s are the direction that the earth’s food sources have been moving for hundreds of years, from the selective breeding process that led to modern day corn, from its wheat like ancestor, to the newly developed fish that are able to breed and grow at accelerated rates.

            Imagine the potato famine that struck Ireland and the widespread pain and hardship that that caused. The reason for the crop failing was in a large part due to a blight that struck the potato crop causing them to wither and die. Now imagine a different scenario where the Irish potatoes are modified with a gene that causes them to be immune to the potato blight. This could have potentially saved tens of thousands of lives and mitigated one of the worst disasters of the modern era.

            Another example of GMO’s having a positive impact on world health, is the widely distributed yellow rice. The rice is yellow because of the added beta-carotene that is induced to grow in the plant through gene therapy. The reason that this is done is because beta-carotene is essential to eye health and in many countries the local diet lacks it, and suffers from eye problems. This addition to food is one of many that is important to most developing countries that do not have access to fresh fruits and vegetables, many of which are very hard to ship fresh. So GMO’s are vital to the health and wellbeing of millions of people, and to deny them the food they need is deplorable.

            These are just two of the applications where GMO’s can be put to great use, however there are many situations where they can be used as well. Disease kills a large portion of the world’s crops, as does drought, and other extreme weather acts. There is a GMO that is already developed in in development that can solve most of these issues. Climate change is only exacerbating this issue, areas that were wet are only getting wetter, and those that are dry are only getting drier, and there are still more areas that are experiencing record droughts and rainfall in back to back years. This makes it very hard for native species to adapt because the climate is changing rapidly due to human action, it only makes sense that humans can help the plants to adapt to the changing climate.

            The main objections to GMO are that we cannot possibly know the health risk associated with inserting foreign DNA into these crops. Though more than 15 years of experience with GMO’s have revealed no health dangers, and neither have a series of scientific studies. Most people seem to object to the idea that GMO’s exist. More than having any objections based on actual science. The resistance to GMO’s will be overcome as the need for them rises, the need for them will undoubtedly overcome the fear of them.