Guest essay by E. Calvin Beisner
In late May two evangelical environmentalists, recently returned from visiting Malawi, published articles in which they said poor Malawians are suffering from reduced rainfall caused by manmade global warming.
Jonathan Merritt wrote for Religion News Service, “In America, climate change is a matter of debate, but in places like Malawi, it’s a matter of life and death.” Judd Birdsall wrote for Huffington Post, “In Fombe village, Malawi, climate change is not a matter of political or scientific debate. It’s a matter of survival.”
The implication was clear: To help the poor in Malawi (and other developing nations), we must fight global warming.
If either author had dug deeper, he might have concluded differently.
Although the controversial Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature (BEST) project reports about 0.6°C of warming for Malawi from about 1970 to about 2010, the data are highly suspect, coming from fewer than 10 monitoring stations in a country that stretches nearly 600 miles from north to south, averages about 75 miles wide, and is slightly larger in area than the State of Ohio. Granted the widespread deviance of temperature monitoring stations even in the U.S. from standards set to ensure accuracy, and the likelihood that “urban heat island” effect (which occurs even in small villages) accounts for about half of apparent global and regional warming in recent decades, it’s likely that BEST’s data for Malawi considerably exaggerate any warming there.
Economic development also causes fictitious appearance of rising regional temperatures. As climatologist and former missionary to Kenya Dr. John Christy put it in an email, “I doubt any UHI corrections were applied to [BEST’s] Malawi temp data. … As we report in both of my papers (Kenya/Tanzania and Uganda), East Africa has a real problem with development showing up as rising nighttime (and therefore TMean [mean of daytime maximum and nighttime minimum]) temperatures. Since Malawi borders Tanzania, I would expect the same to be true there.”
Source: UAH Lower Tropospheric Temperature data v. 5.5, Malawi data extracted and graph prepared by John Christy, University of Alabama, Huntsville. Note: Y-axis is anomaly from mean temperature for the period in degrees Celsius. Red arrow is IPCC computer model projectins; blue line is satellite observations.
Although the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s computer models projected about 0.7°C of warming from 1979 through 2012 for Malawi, satellite measurements—unaffected by the problems that compromise land-based data—show no statistically significant trend in temperature.
Accurate rainfall measurements are very difficult to find for Malawi, but data for nearby East Africa show a slight increase in rainfall in the late twentieth century
Birdsall wrote that farmers “in every village” told him, “Until just a few decades ago the rains came by mid October and fell steadily until March. … These days the rains often don’t come until December. Sometimes it rains too much, sometimes too little. Flooding and drought can occur in the same season. The climate has changed.”
Similarly, Merritt wrote, “An elderly man from Fombe village … told me that water streamed here year round when he was a child. Banana trees and other vegetation once flourished on its banks, and an abundance of fish provided a critical source of protein for those who lived nearby. In 1977, however, the waters began receding and now flow only a handful of days each year.”
Of course, childhood memories are notoriously poor data sources, both for the past and for comparison with the present, but Merritt added this graph, from the 2006 Action Aid report (click graph to enlarge), showing apparent increases in droughts and floods.
Yet drought and flood data are no substitute for rainfall measurements. They reflect changes in population and land use, as climatologist Dr. David Legates explained in his lecture on global warming for Cornwall Alliance’s Resisting the Green Dragon video series. As population grows, demand for water increases, not just for drinking but also for agriculture, industry, and other uses, resulting in more frequent and severe droughts—even with no change in rainfall. Malawi’s population nearly tripled, from about 5.7 million to 16.8 million, from 1977 to 2013.
Population growth also results in land use changes. As land becomes more paved or built up, it absorbs less rain, sending more runoff into streams, which then flood more frequently and severely—again, even with no change in rainfall. As undeveloped land is converted to agriculture, demand for irrigation water grows, and agricultural land in Malawi grew by 43 percent from 1977 through 2011 and 75 percent from 1961 through 2011.
Land Used for Agriculture, Malawi, 1961–2011 (click graph to enlarge)
In reality, while rainfall amounts have risen and fallen in Malawi since 1900, there is no significant trend, as the data in the table below show. In 1990–2009, Malawi’s average monthly rainfall was 4% higher than in 1900–1930, 0.5% lower than in 1930–1960, 3.1% lower than in 1960–1990, and virtually identical to the average for the full 110 years, and there was no apparent delay or shortening of rainy seasons.
Malawi Average Monthly Rainfall (mm), 1900–2009
| 1900–2009 | 1900–1930 | 1930–1960 | 1960–1990 | 1990–2009 | |
| Jan | 229.4 | 217.4 | 234.2 | 230.8 | 236.7 |
| Feb | 207.8 | 202.7 | 218.2 | 206.7 | 200.8 |
| Mar | 204.5 | 194.8 | 207.2 | 205.2 | 210.2 |
| Apr | 93.1 | 97.1 | 88.4 | 98.3 | 85.3 |
| May | 22.0 | 21.3 | 23.1 | 21.7 | 21.9 |
| Jun | 8.5 | 7.9 | 9.7 | 8.4 | 7.8 |
| Jul | 7.0 | 6.9 | 6.0 | 7.1 | 18.1 |
| Aug | 2.9 | 2.8 | 3.0 | 2.6 | 3.1 |
| Sep | 2.6 | 2.9 | 2.9 | 2.6 | 3.1 |
| Oct | 13.9 | 16.5 | 10.5 | 14.6 | 13.6 |
| Nov | 66.9 | 57.7 | 68.5 | 75.0 | 62.4 |
| Dec | 193.3 | 180.2 | 185.4 | 212.5 | 188.7 |
| Annual | 1,051.9 | 1,008.2 | 1,057.1 | 1,085.5 | 1,051.7 |
Note: September 1900-1930 and 1930-1960, 2.9 (mean of existing September data) supplied for blank cells to permit computation of percentages.
Are poor Malawians suffering from water shortages? Yes. Is that because of global warming—manmade or natural? No. Is fighting global warming the solution? No.
Malawi is actually a water-rich nation. Not only does its annual rainfall average approximately 40 inches (about the same as Delaware, Indiana, Maryland, and New Jersey), but also it includes much of Lake Malawi—“third largest and second deepest lake in Africa [and] the ninth largest in the world.”
About 80 percent of Malawi is within 75 miles of Lake Malawi, and most of what isn’t is within 50 miles of the Shire River, which flows south from the lake and eventually joins the might Zambezi River. Fifty miles is a distance easily covered by aqueducts. Fombe—where Merritt and Birdsall visited and heard the anecdotes about declining stream flow—is at least potentially a water-rich village. It is a mere 10 miles from the Shire.
For comparison, the Roman aqueducts, built two millennia ago, carried water 260 miles, and the system of aqueducts constituting the California State Water Project (SWP) provides drinking water for over 23 million people (over 1/3 third more than the entire population of Malawi) by transporting water hundreds of miles from the Colorado River, the Sierra Nevada, and central and northern California. The shortest, the Colorado River Aqueduct, is over 240 miles long.
Of course, California is wealthy (though it wasn’t nearly so wealthy when much of the SWP was built), and Malawi is poor. How can Malawi afford to build such aqueducts—even if they would cover far less distance and serve only a small fraction of the people?
The real solution to Malawi’s water needs is economic growth that will enable Malawians to bear the costs of improved water transportation, storage, purification, and conservation through efficient use.
Sad to say, however, if climate change activists succeed in enacting policies to fight global warming, Malawi’s economic growth will be curtailed. Why? Because abundant, reliable, affordable energy is an essential condition of economic growth, and activists seek to fight global warming by shunning the use of the most reliable and affordable energy sources for the developing world—coal and natural gas—and putting far more expensive “Green” energy sources like wind and solar in their place. As it happens, Malawi has abundant coal reserves and already mines them (PDF download), though it could benefit from mining far more to generate electricity and deliver its people from the smoke that comes from burning wood and dried dung as primary cooking and heating fuels—smoke that causes high rates of illness and premature death, especially among women and children, from respiratory diseases.
Ironically, and sadly, the climate policy Merritt and Birdsall want will only bring further harm to the very people they long to help, by prolonging their poverty—the real threat to Malawians’ health and life.
E. Calvin Beisner, Ph.D., is Founder and National Spokesman of the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation and author of several books on environmental stewardship.
TomR,Worc,MA,USA says:
June 7, 2013 at 3:26 pm
“Greens by and large have not thought their actions through to there ultimate result.”
Greens are at most stage one thinkers; on the level of a 5 year old – “I WANT” – for instance, STOP GLOBAL WARMING. and that’s it. Feedbacks or dynamic systems are beyond their comprehension.
Of course this includes noncomprehension of market mechanisms. And no, you can’t make the market go away by outlawing it, you would just create a black market and corruption, which is again a market, the market of offering access to power for money.
They would happily install, say, socialism if they thought it helped the environment, only to run out of toilet paper – and then blame evil Americans or whomever.
They are about as dangerous as a 5 year old; and when they happen to gain the power over a nation with nuclear bombs, they are about as dangerous as a 5 year old in control of nuclear weapons.
So if they demand your candy, better hand over the candy. The laws of stupidity apply. A stupid person is the most dangerous person in the world.
http://www.ecotopia.com/webpress/Stupidity/
It is worth checking out the invaluable CIA Factbook about Malawi:
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/mi.html
Malawi is one of the poorest countries in the world. It has been plagued by lousy governance, superstition, foreign meddling and a range of other problems for a long time.
Its climate is entirely peripheral to the state that it is in. There are plenty of countries with more difficult climates that are doing a whole lot better.
No doubt the Malawi elite are slavering at the chops at the prospect of free money because they are the victims of climate change caused by the evil (but, fortunately, rich) West.
After a recent vacation to Tanzania, Rwanda, and Uganda, it was apparent that water storage and distribution was the key to solve most of their problems. Of course, that solution would have to wait for political improvement, and that is probably the stumbling block for almost all progress in Africa.
So called “sustainable” water policies include onerous restrictions on water use, and increased expense. Saying that increased population is straining the water supply, or predicting that “nature will reduce the population,” assumes that there are no “sustainable” water restrictions in place sabotaging the cultivation and irrigation of land which support the people who live in Malawi.
“Sustainable” policies are destructive to life giving energy and agricultural output, as the article points out, and are a deadly form of eco-colonialism as another poster pointed out.
However, one has to wonder at some point if there is a spiritual aspect to such underlying hostility towards humanity’s use of water, air, fire, crops, coal, and cattle. Malawian babies are not the problem; World Empire activists for the United Nations and their ridiculous scary water shortage models are more likely the problem.
Jimbo says:
June 7, 2013 at 3:40 pm
Margaret Hardman says:
June 7, 2013 at 2:25 pm
Now Margaret here are some quotes from how some of them may think. Brace yourself.
http://www.green-agenda.com
Jimbo,
Thanks for the link to those ohhhh so priceless quotes !
MtK
What is more convenient for World Empires is to reduce the population in small subject countries so that it is only enough to support the palaces, and maybe a little tourism. A larger country under a World Empire pays tribute (ref) and the economy is subjugated to weaken it and keep it subject. So when World Empire activists/UN scientists talk about overpopulation, do not rule out that it may refer to the fact that too many people cannot be controlled in a communist system supporting its aristocracy. It has nothing to do with resources.
ref:
America’s Real Contribution to U.N. Is Unknown
How much money does the United States currently contribute to the United Nations and its various agencies? Surprisingly, no one knows for sure.
The State Department does report on its spending at the United Nations, but it is only one of several federal agencies that give money to the world body each year.
In its fiscal 2014 State and Foreign Operations budget proposal released in April, the Obama administration asked for $1.57 billion for contributions to international organizations, including $617.6 million for the U.N. operating budget — up from $568.8 million in fiscal 2012. But other agencies giving to the U.N. include the Departments of Labor, Energy, Agriculture, Defense, and Health and Human Services, CNS News reported.
The fact that the population of Malawi is 1930 was around 1.6 million and the population in 2010 was close to 15 million wouldn’t have a thing to do with the increased scarcity of water would it?
Jimbo
What I saw when I clicked on your first link were a lot of people, some of whom used to be famous, spouting about politics. I found approximately one who said something even remotely similar to the comment about suffering. But using my (genuine) sceptical x-ray glasses (from an advert in the Beano circa 1965, I dug a little deeper, to find that the site you sent me to is a bit of a front for these people, Gethsemane Olivet Fellowship ( linky http://www.watchmanspost.com/ ), who, it seems, are a bit against people themselves, since only the chosen ones will be resurrected by God in the end times. Seems a bit mean, don’t you think. Those poor misguided souls whose only crime was to be born in a country that isn’t Christian.
No, I think the quotes were all about trying to convince others that world governance which, it would appear, is one of the probably spurious signs that we shouldn’t make hideouts in the wilderness because it won’t do us any good anyway.
http://www.watchmanspost.com/datesandpeople/oneworldgovt.html
I myself am prepared for Comet Ison. I have my telescopes and my thermos of tea all ready for November for perihelion. Perhaps that will presage the end of the world. http://www.cometison2013.co.uk/
As for the other link, well, it’s just Godwin’s Law (http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/godwins-law) hidden in a semi-academic essay. (Interesting that the bottom of the essay links to a radical left/anarchist publisher’s website. (http://www.akpress.org/) The glaring right wing meeting the eadical left seems a different mixture.) Nice to know but not really that convincing in the end. I know the Nazis were into (1) a romantic notion of the environment, and (2) wholesale slaughter of Jews, gays, Romanies and political opponents but I did learn a little which is more than can be said for the spurious Green Agenda website. No, wrong. I learnt that, just like the digging I did around Intelligent Design and Moon landing hoax sites, it usually comes down to the argument from personal incredulity. I can’t believe it therefore it cannot be so. I was initially turned off by many “Green” claims of impending disaster on this, that or the other, but when I got past the incredulity, the issues didn’t go away, the evidence (yes, there is evidence and it gets put on this site on a daily basis by the great and good of the “skeptic” movement) didn’t go away and eventually it forced me to accept the “warmist” (there, I’ve said it) position. It didn’t hurt. But now I know I shall be going to Hell for it.
Well, I am not joining the slow train coming round the bend. I asked if there was evidence and this isn’t it. After all, it wasn’t some greens, or a few greens or one or two greens that like to inflict suffering and death, it was greens. And a bunch of quotes, most of them from politicians, that are collected to inflame the paranoia of a bunch of people who, frankly, ought to use their brains with the critical thinking module dialled up to at least eight out of ten, to see that politicians say stuff because they want to get elected. Some of it they believe, some of it they don’t, I’m sure.
So, as an attempt to answer my question, the links you provided are a fail.
“In late May two evangelical environmentalists…”
I see two self-righteous swami guru hippies in white turbans and flowing robes. (: Or two you-know-whos issuing a Fat Wah.
This discussion, sadly has once again devolved into either a slanging match about ideology or claims that the problem is that there are too many Malawians.
It is fairly typical of the level of debate about poor countries in the West. I wonder why centuries of missionaries and billions of dollars of aid have made no appreciable difference?
Blame seems to be very important to the Greens. It is vital that the right people are blamed. The story of climate change harming the people of Malawi is correct because the right people are blamed. Nobody wants to question it too deeply. When you have the “right” answer you must not ask awkward questions.
Could you detail how you get regional (or national) data out of the UAH tropospheric data?
UAH data comes in 5-degree grids. So it’s quite fungible.
Climate Change is the greatest threat that human civilization has ever faced. – Angela Merkel, German Chancellor
The irony! It burns!
What are they teaching in these schools?
I have friends who have done aid work in Africa. They speak of villagers unwilling to help in the slightest way to build a school for their own kids unless they were paid. They speak of the inability to get anything done unless everyone in a position of authority is bribed. You must have a large budget for bribes to operate in Africa at all. They speak of rampant theft of construction materials and driving back a week later to find that the brand new school building they had constructed had been completely demolished and nobody willing to talk about who had done it. Apparently they forgot to bribe the right person to “protect” it. They speak of soldiers setting up random road blocks and extorting money from passers by because they hadn’t been paid. They speak of the fear of the dangerous men with machetes and guns living out in the bush who sweep in from time to time and commit random atrocities. They speak of a widespread belief in magic and a market in the sale of body parts from babies and children. It is very dangerous and very frustrating work and I admire the people willing to do it. One of my friends nearly died from malaria contracted while working there. Another member of their group (a woman) was shot in the head at a road block shortly after they left.
My friend was not based in Malawi and Africa is very large and diverse place. Nevertheless these stories illustrate some of the reasons that outsiders like missionaries and aid workers can fail to have much impact in Africa. A society can be so dysfunctional that it cannot easily be helped.
Margaret Hardman says:
June 7, 2013 at 4:59 pm
__________________
Hello Margaret. Some questions for you…
You took offense that someone lumped all of you Greens together, but you seem to portray Gethsemane Olivet Fellowship as speaking for all Christians. Why is that?
You come here everyday and see proofs of global warming verified? Where are the links to threads here which make your case?
Let’s say for a moment that average Mom and Pop Greens have their heart in the right place, but just haven’t critically examined the outcome of their policies. Would that explain what you find in these links?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/elderhealth/9959856/Its-the-cold-not-global-warming-that-we-should-be-worried-about.html
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/383823/Deaths-up-by-30-000-in-big-freeze
What about the Green policies as set forth by the Big Boys… do you want to throw in with these guys? http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2010/11/18/un-ipcc-official-we-redistribute-worlds-wealth-climate-policy
The last thing Africa needs is any more whiteboy eco-evangelists running around creating more problems for them … homeboys should stay at home and leave Africa alone, it doesn’t need your meddling or your prescription for what you think it needs to be. I have fond memories of ‘old’ Malawi so do me a favour and buzz off! Africans have survived for a lot longer than your lot and will still be around when your lot leave to join the mothership in the tail of the comet.
Slightly OT – just to illustrate the idiocracy in which we live, I saw a “USA Today” rag in Frankfurt airport a few minutes ago which leads with a big 2-page article on a new spin on the CO2 AGW scare. Perhaps an interesting insight into their evolving tactics in CAGW command bunker. The story is that CO2 is causing plant growth to increase (they concede this) BUT – its bad, not good, especially since more plant growth = more pollen = more hayfever and breathing allergy problems. There was a hero amateur allergy specialist collecting pollen samples from his roof and tracking an increase. The headline was “climate change is affecting every breath you take”.
So maybe the AGW command bunker is preparing a narrative to deal with incontrovertible evidence of planetary greening from CO2 (a.k.a. Mat Ridley), its a sort of “Day of the Triffids” theme – now plants are bad.
This is all the more evidence of the Nietsche – Nihilism – Love Of Death philosophy driving CAGW. Looking at life, they see only death.
Luther
“You took offense that someone lumped all of you Greens together, but you seem to portray Gethsemane Olivet Fellowship as speaking for all Christians. Why is that?”
I didn’t lump all Christians together with the Gethsemane Olivet Fellowship and all comments about the group were specific to them. If I didn’t make that clear then I apologise althugh how you could jump from what I did say to your assertion I don’t know. I wasn’t taking offence at the risible comment about greens, I was merely pointing out how risible it was. I find some of the comments about funding of scientists funny when the funding on both sides is open to question. And I don’t actually consider myself a green. I just take the philosophy that I look after my home because someone else might want to live there one day.
Thank you, however, for the links. I’ve long since given up reading newspapers without checking facts or looking for sources. The Daily Express doesn’t have a good track record on some stories (Diana, Madeleine McCann for example) and I know that it is now a laughing stock for its front page stories on the weather. Read Flat Earth News by Nick Davies to see how newspapers operate all too often. I was a long time reader of the Daily Telegraph. No longer.
Of course the impact of any drought wasn’t made worse by the political elite selling the countries maize reserves and stealing the proceeds.
“Ian H says:
June 7, 2013 at 7:23 pm”
Very good and accurate post. TIA, This Is Africa (A phrase used in the movie “Blood Diamond”). With aid from developed nations such as the USA, Aus, the UK etc going to Africa, most of it is siphoned off into the pockets on corrupt officials. Almost none of the aid goes to where it was intended. Some aid does get through, and there is evidence to support that, but what mostly happens is that poor people in rich counties get poorer while rich people in poor countries get richer. The poor just fight over the scraps.
East Africa is stunning. The land, people, food, cultures, truly stunning. It also is very wet and green. True there are many arid areas such as the Afar region in Ethiopia, but MOST of the land where people live is green and very productive.
Rain fall isn’t the problem (Although rain fall did change thousands of years ago over Ethiopia that lead to the drying of Giza), but available water is. There is a shortage of clean safe drinking water, I know for fact, in Ethiopia and likely true in other East African countries too. There are massive hydro systems diverting flows from the river systems. 80% of the water that fell over the “Whispering Falls” (Sometimes called the Blue Nile Falls) on the Blue Nile in Ethiopia is diverted for hydro power. You have people living in mud/wood huts near the falls and right next to them, in what was their farmland, are brand new shiny new galvanised pylons taking power to the city. In fact some of those huts had power meters installed. Contrast is not a word to use to adequately describe the imagery.
Many people are being displaced for resource mining, oil/coal/gas/precious stones and metals. None of that wealth is being trickled down to the locals. None of the locals are even being employed, workers are imported. Many people are being forced off their land for “carbon sequestration” projects.
But there is a bigger problem. The Blue Nile flows into The White Nile. There is a massive hydro/dam project being built in Ethiopia, it’s the biggest such project, at US$4.5bil, in the entire expanse of Africa. It’s called Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam and it has ALL of the downstream countries concerned. Watch out for (More) strife in the region in the coming years.
Good post and echoes what I have said for years- development helps the environment more than all the ”well meaning” ecologists/environmentalists on the planet. If Malawi has coal then for goodness sake burn it for cheap power.
Relevant: land restoration in Rwanda (water security restored): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aw5HdwTTLIk
Sorry Mods, syntax eeror again in my e-mail address!
Margaret Hardman says:
June 7, 2013 at 2:25 pm
@ChadWozniak
“Greens just love to cause needless suffering and death.”
………
===========================================
Well Margret, your assertion that Jimbos quotes were just from a group of politicians, is hardly a reasonable objection to the assertion. Those politicians, who universally cry out about how overpopulated the planet is, have used hundreds of billions of dollars of public funds to further their agenda of shutting down inexpensive energy to the worlds poor. The historical portion of his two links was indeed a valid criticism of the political aspect of the green movement. The green movement is not the [first] human endevour to bring in religious overtones to a political statist agenda. (I suggest you study “The Mythopoetic origins of Marxism”) as a scholarly example.
The point is their policy does cause suffering and death, their words point to a clear desire to depopulate the planet, and they demand a statist one world type government, and have hundreds of billions of dollars at their disposal.
The only reasonable objection you have as I see it, is that I do not know if they “love” the suffering their policy creates, or if they are merely apathetic to it, considering it [necessary] for their utopia. However I do not care about their internal feeling. I do wish to wish to ensure their failure.
David
I have just reread the quotes and I still cannot find one that justifies or supports the assertion that “Greens just love to cause needless suffering and death”. I don’t have the time at the moment to chase down every quote to see if it really is what was said (like I have said, I am properly sceptical, not gullibly skeptical as so many that hang about on this site seem to be).
My objection is that you do not know, nor does anyone else, that greens love the suffering. I actually suspect they don’t love it at all but when I asked for evidence to support the assertion I was linked to 87 (the Australian devil’s number) quotes mostly on the subject of world governance which is a premise of the background Gethsemane Olivet Foundation’s that the end of days is coming. Some of them, eg “The spiritual sense of our place in nature…
can be traced to the origins of human civilization….The last vestige of organized goddess worship
was eliminated by Christianity.” (Al Gore) seem strange on such a site but I don’t know if the GOF is a Catholic organisation (and therefore worships a goddess in all but name) or not. They certainly don’t like the Gaia hypothesis (which I don’t either but I don’t get worried about it) or Mikhail Gorbachev. But taken as a whole or individually, it still doesn’t tell me that greens love to inflict suffering.
As for our hated Nazis, well, I don’t doubt they were nasty people who loved animals and trees. Except of course that the main reason they were evil is not that they loved animals and trees but that they bought the real hoax of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and wove it into a sick ideology. I don’t have any time for Marxism either. I would have called myself libertarian until I came across some of the “swivel eyed loons” (copyright David Cameron, 2013) that are proud to claim the libertarian tag and are nothing but.
Conflict of interest: degree in biology, still not watched An Inconvenient Truth