The world needs to buy time to save its natural wonders and its high-risk populations from the effects of climate change, according to the conservation group World Wildlife Fund.
The organisation says the scale of destruction triggered by the problem will affect everything from the wonders of the Amazon to the Himalayas if global warming continues at current rates.
Work is already going on to build defences against the damaging impacts on prized natural environments, including the Great Barrier Reef, the Upper Yangtze river, and east African coastal forests. Experts are involved in long-term planning to save Hawksbill turtles in the Caribbean, wild salmon in the Bering Sea, and the people and tigers of the Indian Sundarbans, says the WWF study.
The scientist in charge of the organisation's global climate change programme, Lara Hansen, told a press conference in Brussels: "While we continue to pressure governments to make meaningful cuts in heat trapping greenhouse gas emissions, we are also working on adaptation strategies to offer protection to some of the world's natural wonders, as well as the livelihoods of the people who live there."
She added: "We are trying to buy people and nature time, as actions to stop the root cause of climate change are taken." - (PA)