Bernardi Michele
Climate Change and Bioenergy Unit, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Rome, Italy.
Geospat Health. 2008 May;2(2):137-50. doi: 10.4081/gh.2008.238.
There are two responses to global climate change. First, mitigation, which actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and sequester or store carbon in the short-term, and make development choices that will lead to low emissions in the long-term. Second, adaptation, which involves adjustments in natural or human systems and behaviours that reduce the risks posed by climate change to people's lives and livelihoods. While the two are conceptually distinct, in practice they are very much interdependent, and both are equally urgent from a healthy population perspective. To define the policies to mitigate and to adapt to global climate change, data and information at all scales are the basic requirement for both developed and developing countries. However, as compared to mitigation, adaptation is an immediate concern for low-income countries and for small islands states, where the reduction of the emissions from greenhouse gases is not among their priorities. Adaptation is also highly location specific and the required ground data to assess the impacts of climate change on human health are not available. Climate data at high spatial resolution can be derived by various downscaling methods using historical and real-time meteorological observations but, particularly in low-income countries, the outputs are limited by the lack of ground data at the local level. In many of these countries, a negative trend in the number of meteorological stations as compared as to before 2000 is evident, while remotely-sensed imagery becomes more and more available at high spatial and temporal resolution. The final consequence is that climate change policy options in the developing world are greatly jeopardized.
对于全球气候变化有两种应对措施。其一为减缓，即采取行动在短期内减少温室气体排放并封存或储存碳，并做出有助于长期实现低排放的发展选择。其二为适应，这涉及对自然或人类系统及行为进行调整，以降低气候变化对人们生活和生计构成的风险。虽然这两者在概念上有所不同，但在实践中它们相互依存度很高，并且从健康人口的角度来看两者都同样紧迫。要确定减缓及适应全球气候变化的政策，所有尺度的数据和信息对于发达国家和发展中国家而言都是基本要求。然而，与减缓相比，适应是低收入国家和小岛屿国家当前更为关注的问题，因为减少温室气体排放并非其优先事项。适应还具有高度的地域特异性，且缺乏用于评估气候变化对人类健康影响所需的地面数据。高空间分辨率的气候数据可通过各种降尺度方法利用历史和实时气象观测数据得出，但特别是在低收入国家，由于缺乏地方层面的地面数据，这些数据的产出受到限制。在许多此类国家，与2000年之前相比，气象站数量呈明显的下降趋势，而高空间和时间分辨率的遥感影像则越来越容易获取。最终的结果是，发展中世界的气候变化政策选择受到极大的损害。
