Hot Topic - Climate Change Effects on World...

Droughts, floods and hurricanes may sound like the stuff of disaster films, but it could be the future for some of our favourite tourist destinations if global warming has its way.

From wildlife safari spots in Africa to idyllic tropical beaches in Asia, it's developing countries that are amongst the most vulnerable to the effects of climate change, and the most powerless to do anything about it. And the irony is that these are not the countries responsible for pouring carbon dioxide into our atmosphere. Accelerated global warming is largely caused by the economic activities of rich, industrialised countries – those that are home to the very tourists who are blowing more carbon emissions on flights across the globe.

Although it's difficult to link global warming to specific weather events, many scientists argue that the rise in temperatures will trigger glacial retreat, Arctic shrinkage, rising sea levels and rainfall changes that in turn bring flooding and drought.

Many of the problems developing countries already face will get much worse. In Africa, for example, there are signs that countries are already suffering. Arid regions are becoming drier, while rainier areas are getting wetter. In 2001, Kenya experienced its worst drought in 60 years, affecting more than four million people. On Senegal's south coast, land at Rufisque is being lost to rising sea levels. Natural landmarks could change forever; the ice on Mount Kilimanjaro, for example, could disappear completely over the next few decades, and melting glaciers on the Rwenzori Mountains in Uganda have shrunk by 75% since the 1990s. And, to top it all, higher annual temperatures have been linked to malaria expanding into Tanzania's Usamabara Mountains – which is bad news for travellers and locals alike.
For many countries in Africa where tourism is an important part of the economy, it's going to be a tough job in the future to market destinations where travellers risk facing drought or food shortages first hand, or encountering floods that will prevent them getting where they want to go - or, worse still, claiming their lives.

Here is a climate change video produced by disaster relief organisation Oxfam that is a simple animation to highlight the injustice of climate change.

Many famous destinations could be irreversibly changed: Tanzania's Serengeti National Park is one of the best places in the world to go on safari because of its wide variety of wildlife - but higher temperatures in the future could damage and change the habitat, forcing species to migrate away from the park and destroying its tourism potential.