Earthlife Africa finds it ridiculous and also alarming that Gareth Cliff of 5fm radio is so ill-informed about the nature, causes and implications of climate change.

Commentators like Gareth Cliff like to court an image of controversy or defiance and to portray themselves as independent thinkers. However, to suggest that climate change science and the UN response is somehow the product of a self-serving conspiracy of 'greenies' or meddlesome bureaucrats is so numbingly naive and ill-informed as to suggest a total lack of thought.

Asserting that there is still some debate over whether our massive consumption of fossil fuels (stored energy accumulated over hundreds of millions of years) and resulting greenhouse gas emissions are having any impact on our climate system may make for provocative media coverage, but such willful ignorance is highly irresponsible.

Gareth Cliff is evidently of the opinion that climate change has nothing to do with human activity. Changes in the Earth’s climate include changes in the temperature, wind patterns and precipitation, which occur naturally but are also induced and exacerbated by human activities. Climate change has been scientifically attributed to human activities. Observations of the sea levels, concentrations of CO2 and the global average temperature have shown a steady increase unlike those of the natural warming and cooling of the planet Earth. A clear link exists between changes observed in the earth’s climate and the acceleration of fossil fuel burning since the industrial revolution beginning in the 1850’s.

Carbon dioxide emitted from South African coal-fired power stations emit a large amount of CO2 into the atmosphere, which has earned us a ranking amongst the top carbon emitters in the world. In fact, the average world CO2 production per person is 4 tons/ year and South Africa rises well above that at 10 tons/person/year.

If we continue to emit greenhouse gases at the rate that we have been in recent history, then we are likely to face further signs of climate change from global warming. Impacts already observed and those we are likely to experience are; the further melting of the polar ice caps resulting in rising sea levels, erratic weather patters with more extreme storms, droughts and flooding, the expansion of infectious disease areas, water shortages, food shortages and the extinctions of plant and animal species. Due to the slow impact of greenhouse gas emissions, we are already committed to global warming of about twice that which has occurred since the start of the industrial revolution. If we do not slow down and then reverse the rate of emissions, we condemn our children to deal with climate chaos - devastation beyond our imagination, including hundreds of millions of environmental refugees.

Many opportunities exist to become informed about climate change. These include information available from the South African Government, schools, environmental and social justice organisations and on the internet. This week, An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore’s documentary about climate change opens in cinemas nationwide.

Climate change will affect your life and that of your family and friends, as well as future generations. Earthlife Africa urges all South Africans to become informed about this important issue and to begin to combat this threat by becoming more energy conscious and by lobbying industry and government to take drastic measures to avert disaster.

The Sustainable Energy and Climate Change (SECCP) project of Earthlife Africa challenges Gareth Cliff to debate this issue on his show, so that listeners may receive balanced and well-informed information about climate change.