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THESE are difficult times for farmers as the fodder shortage continues apace. In Clare, good work and cooperation has led to the early cutting of silage at Shannon Airport and the provision of some extra feed but reports indicate demand has far outstripped supply.

Of course, you don’t have to be a farmer to realise just how ridiculously odd the weather has been in recent years. Last year’s waterlogged summer, combined with the seemingly endless winter, have been a topic of conversation for many people and rightly so. It feels like the seasons are changing.

 

This is big news, considering the order and nature of these seasons are among the first things we teach children in schools. The altering weather patterns and increase in extreme weather events would seem to provide concrete evidence that climate change is real and underway.

It is very surprising, therefore, that the topic is not higher up the political agenda. A review of the Fine Gael and Labour websites and recent press releases failed to turn up any significant mention of the issue of climate change or the need to address the changing weather patterns.

Similarly, the speech given by Micheál Martin at the Fianna Fáil Ard Fheis contains no mention of the issue of climate change. Those within the party I consulted said it was also absent from the list of motions.
Michael Martin’s speech was laid out under the following headings: fairness matters, job creation, small business, household debt, property tax, strong safe communities, schools, public service, real political reform, Europe and Northern Ireland. That these are all important political issues is not in doubt but if the issue of climate change is not addressed, none of them will really matter. The discussions around the current fodder crisis are also notable for the absence of climate change as an issue. This is surprising but also a little worrying.

While researching this piece, I spoke to a number of people in Clare about the absence of climate change from the political agenda and was surprised by the extent to which people seem resigned to what they see as the inevitability of the phenomenon. I am at a loss as to whether this is down to pragmatism or a more defeatist mind-set.

If this is the attitude of the general population, it’s not all that surprising climate change is so rarely spoken of by politicians. The current economic crisis has understandably dominated the political discourse in recent years but allowing an issue as important as climate change to slip off the political agenda to the extent it has, seems to me extremely unwise.

Many people make the very valid argument that Ireland is just one small nation in a wider world and that any action it takes to reduce carbon emissions and tackle climate change will have no real effect.

This is a reasonable statement. China’s expansion and construction boom appears to be continuing apace, although reports are beginning to trickle out that indicate it might be slowing down. Even if it does slow down, the levels of greenhouse gasses being generated and the levels of pollution are still astronomical.
Xinhuanet reported in January of this year that, “China will have the second-largest volume of domestic flight passengers, after the US, by 2016, with 415 million fliers”. This would seem to spell doom for the efforts to reduce greenhouse gases but it can be tempered by the news early this year that US emissions were at their lowest level since 1994.

Forbes reported that emissions were down 13% in just five years and that if the trend continues, President Obama’s target of a 17% reduction on 2005 levels by 2020 would be met. It might be one piece of good news in a sea of bad but it is good news all the same.

Councillor Brian Meaney recently announced that he had not renewed his membership of the Green Party and has, in fact, joined Fianna Fáil. A statement on his website says he feels the policies that had been green 20 years ago are now mainstream and he sees Fianna Fáil as the party “most likely to put these policies in place for the future”.

It will be interesting to see if this is the case and indeed if the Fianna Fáil party will accept him into the fold. We will have answers to these questions in time but, unfortunately, we will also very likely have continued climate change.

John Sweeny of NUI Maynooth is Ireland’s member of the IGPCC. He has stated clearly that the current weather patterns are occurring as a consequence of climate change.

The current fodder crisis and appalling weather over the last year should be taken as a call to arms. Sceptics may continue to debate the nuances of the scientific evidence of this topic but I, for one, have seen all I need to when cattle are dying and farming families are being pushed to the point of ruin by changing weather patterns.

If this is what we are experiencing now, then what may come is a terrifying prospect. Our children will be the ones who reap the worst excesses of what we do today, so to ignore the issue is to fail and betray them. This most important issue must be brought firmly back on the Irish political agenda and steps must be taken to address emissions.

Other nations might continue to spew out greenhouse gasses to the detriment of us all but to use them as an excuse to not take action ourselves is a risible attempt to abdicate ourselves of our responsibility.
We can’t predict accurately what sort of a summer we will have this year but I don’t think anyone will be surprised if it turns out to be a whole lot like last year. Our climate is changing and it doesn’t take a farmer or a meteorologist to see it.

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