Sorry for the late post! I head out early tomorrow morning for work, so yesterday and last night was all about my kids. I make no apology.
Several patterns of climate change in Mexico will be very familiar in the context of a tropical climate: more intense and longer dry seasons, and wet seasons which might yield more rain on average, but will do so more erratically, with more violent downpours interspersed with increasingly frequent droughts. In a country as richly biodiverse as Mexico, changing climate patterns will have widespread and thorough effects on the biome, incurring changes in plant and animal species.
Annual CO2 emissions, Mexico.
Cumulative CO2 emissions, Mexico.
Mexico’s economy is ranked 15th in the world, at $1.3T/$91.8T, or 1.4%. Mexico’s share of carbon emissions is almost identical by percentage, at 1.3%. Mexico is one of the countries with mid-sized economies (if at the high end of that range) caught in the pincers of trying to encourage economic development, at the same time that that development is contributing to known damage to its population and economy. All too often now the road of economic development is pursued with little or no regard to the environmental costs, under the faith that later adaptation will mend the problem. Mexican policy of recent years exemplifies this self-destructive behavior, but it is following powerful models in the United States and other much larger economies.
Per capita CO2 emissions, Mexico.
Mexico's climate performance, per Climate Action Tracker.
Rising temperatures are already affecting agriculture in the central and southern zones, including the Yucatán Peninsula. Wheat crops are declining by as much as 60% in some villages as soils increasingly dry out. Similarly, yields of maize, one of Mexico’s staple crops, are expected to drop by 7% by 2050 due to increasing heat and drought, while the number of varieties declines due to environmental stress. Similar effects are expected in coffee bean production.
Tomorrow: introduction to Greenland.
Be brave, and be well.
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