By E. Geedahgar Garsuah
MONROVIA: The severe impacts of climate change and associated risks have not gone unnoticed as scores of Liberians have raised concern and appear worried, according to the latest Afrobarometer Survey.
The Survey was conducted among Liberians who are aware of climate change.
In response, the survey indicates that “more than two-thirds say climate change is making life worse, a 19-percentage-point increase since 2020.”
Afrobarometer is a non-partisan Pan-African research network that initiates interviews in the language of the respondent’s choice.
The Afrobarometer current team in Liberia is headed by the Center for Democratic Governance (CDG), and has interacted with a representative sample of 1,200 adult citizens during the period from August 25 to September 2022.
According to the survey, a great number of Liberians who have knowledge of the subject, climate change, has expressed worry that the negative impacts of climate change are increasingly making life difficult in the country.
“Three-fourths of the citizens say the government has the primary responsibility for fighting climate change and limiting its impacts,” the Afrobarometer survey noted.
Additionally, the Afrobarometer analysis on the impacts of climate change in Liberia indicates that in support of the Government of Liberia (GoL), those captured in the survey craved the intervention of developed nations by putting mechanisms in place aimed at reducing such severe effects not only in Liberia but in other third-world and /or underdeveloped countries.
According to the survey, 7 in every 10 Liberians are of the view that the central government has been lackadaisical in its method of handling the adverse consequences that climate change poses to the country.
Afrobarometer: “Strong majorities say the government (74%), business and industry (63%), and developed countries (62%) need to do a lot more to limit climate change. Half (49%) say the same about ordinary citizens”.
Approximately four in ten Liberians are not aware of climate change occurrence.
The survey comes on the heel of the World Bank 2021 report which revealed that the influence of climate change in Liberia would intensify prevailing downpour of rain related to disaster risks.
The report which profiled the risks of climate change in Liberia had predicted an increase in life-threatening weather events with higher frequency in decades to come.
The adverse impact of climate change in Liberia, according to the World Bank, would propel the rise in sea level, coastal flooding, and erosion.
The World Bank approximated that 0.8 square kilometer (km) of land has been lost in recent decades to the impact of climate change.
“The Greater Monrovia area alone, a predicted 16cm sea level rise by 2030 would affect 675,000 people and 9,500 hectares of land,” the Bank noted.
The Bank also notes that climate change in Liberia is going to have significant impacts on key sectors such as agriculture, fisheries and energy, and could exacerbate existing social and economic vulnerabilities, particularly among the rural poor.
According to the Global Climate Risk Index 2021, Liberia is ranked as the 29th most vulnerable country to climate change out of 181 countries assessed.
The index takes into account the exposure of a country to climate-related hazards such as extreme weather events, as well as its vulnerability and capacity to cope with, and adapt to these hazards.
