IPCC issues dire warning on climate before Bali talks

摘要

Growth in global CO_2 emissions must be stopped in seven years to prevent the extinction of 25 per cent of the world's species, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) fourth assessment report, released this weekend. The "synthesis report", approved by world governments in Valencia, Spain, on Saturday, predicts a catalogue of disasters including a five per cent drop in global gross domestic product, a 50 per cent reduction in African crop yields, destruction of the Amazon rainforest, widespread droughts, desertification, flooding and fierce storms. It says that the earth's atmosphere already contains enough CO_2 to raise sea levels by nearly 1.5 metres over the next millennium.