Roundup: New UN report sees climate change as one of most significant risks for World Heritage sites

A new UN report said Friday that climate change is fast becoming one of the most significant risks for some 31 natural and cultural World Heritage sites in 29 countries, Farhan Haq, the deputy UN spokesman, told reporters here Friday.

The report, jointly released by the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Union of Concerned Scientists, said that these World Heritage sites are vulnerable to climate change, highlighting the urgency to achieve the Paris Agreement's goal of limiting global temperature rise to a level well below 2 degrees Celsius, Haq said at a daily news briefing here.

The World Heritage and Tourism in a Changing Climate report documented climate impacts including increasing temperatures, melting glaciers, rising seas, intensifying weather events, worsening droughts and longer wildfire seasons, at iconic tourism sites such as Venice, Stonehenge and the Galapagos Islands.

It also covered other World Heritage sites such as South Africa's Cape Floral Kingdom; the port city of Cartagena, Colombia, and Shiretoko National Park in Japan.

The report included a complete list of World Heritage sites that are at risk.

"World governments, the private sector and tourists all need to coordinate their efforts to reduce carbon emissions and to protect the world's most treasured cultural and natural resources from the impact of tourism activities," said Elisa Tonda, head of UNEP's Responsible Industry and Value Chains Unit.

"Policies to decouple tourism from natural resource impacts, carbon emissions and environmental harm will engage a responsible private sector and promote change in tourists' behaviour to realize the sectors' potential in some of the world's most visited places," she said.

Because World Heritage sites must have "Outstanding Universal Value," the report recommended that the World Heritage Committee consider the risk of prospective sites becoming degraded by climate change before they add them to the list.

In particular, the report underscored the urgent need to identify the World Heritage sites that are most vulnerable to climate change, and to implement policies and provide resources to increase resilience at those sites.

Meanwhile, the report also urged increased global efforts to meet the Paris Agreement climate change pledges, in order to preserve World Heritage sites for future generations.

On Dec. 12, 2015, after nearly two weeks of hard bargaining, climate negotiators of 196 parties to the UN conference on climate change in the French capital sealed the Paris Agreement, aiming to reverse the trend of temperature rises mainly caused by carbon emissions.

Experts said that China helped resolve several thorny issues to bring about some key breakthroughs.

On April 22, a total of 175 countries, including China, inked the Pairs Agreement on the first day of its opening for signature at UN Headquarters in New York, a new record in the United Nations' 70-year history.

"Globally, we need to better understand, monitor and address climate change threats to World Heritage sites," said Mechtild Rossler, the director of UNESCO's World Heritage Centre. "As the report's findings underscore, achieving the Paris Agreement's goal of limiting global temperature rise to a level well below 2 degrees Celsius is vitally important to protecting our World Heritage for current and future generations."

In addition, the report also recommended engaging the tourism sector in efforts to manage and protect vulnerable sites in the face of climate change, and to educate visitors about climate threats.

"Climate change is affecting World Heritage sites across the globe," said Adam Markham, lead author of the report and deputy director of the Climate and Energy Program at UCS.

"Some Easter Island statues are at risk of being lost to the sea because of coastal erosion. Many of the world's most important coral reefs, including in the islands of New Caledonia in the western Pacific, have suffered unprecedented coral bleaching linked to climate change this year. Climate change could eventually even cause some World Heritage sites to lose their status," he added. Enditem