Climate change is one of the sensitive issues not only due to its possible negative impact on Egypt, but also due to implications that extend to all the political, economic, social, environmental and security levels, says Environment Minister Khaled Fahmy.
"The results indicate that the cities of the Nile Delta and the north coast would incur losses including the displacement of more than 2 million people engaged in agriculture and fishing, as well as trade and industry," Fahmy said in a press statement on Monday.
"People would lose up to 214,000 job opportunities worth more than US$35 billion."
"Tourist areas will be affected in case the sea level rises by 50 cm," he added.
Fahmy explained that the phenomenon of climate change is defined as an imbalance in the usual climate, such as heat, wind and rainfall, which characterizes each region and leads in the long term to enormous effects on the natural biological systems.
High temperatures lead to changes in the patterns of wind and rainfall, leading to potential several serious climatic events. These events would have wide environmental, social and economic consequences that could be unpredictable.
Scientists have measured a steady increase in Earth's temperatures over the past hundred years that has ranged between 0.5-0.7C, said Fahmy, and human activities from the industrial and technological revolution have led to the increase of greenhouse gas emissions.
He explained that there are six main sources of greenhouse gases: carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), (PFCs), hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6).
The greenhouse gases cause the atmosphere to lock part of the sun's energy, heating the planet earth.
These gases constitute sources of pollution as much as being influential on global warming, especially the carbon dioxide which is produced during the burning of coal, oil and natural gas in power plants, cars plants and others. Deforestation further inceases the carbon dioxide rates.
Methane is also a dangerous gas that contributes to global warming, said Fahmy.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
