Climate change and its impact.
SDG 13 refers to fight against climate change and its consequences for our planet: individuals and economies are affected, weather patterns are changed, weather events are more severe, and sea levels are rising (19 cm rise from 1901 to 2010). Climate change does not respect borders, however the poorest and most vulnerable people are being affected the most, especially women, children and elderly.
Climate related disasters claimed an estimated 1.3 million lives between 1998 and 2017. The world must transform its energy, industry, transport, food, agriculture and forestry systems to ensure that we can limit global climate change. The first target for SDG 13 is to strengthen resilience and adaptive capacity to climate-related hazards and natural disasters in all countries: this means local governments adopting plans for disaster management, as well as limiting the number of deaths and missing persons affected by natural hazards. Every country should plan increasing their ability to adapt to the adverse impacts of climate change, and fostering climate resilience and low greenhouse emissions in a manner that does not threaten food production. 70% of resources invested in global energy supply in 2016 was related to fossil fuels.
In Italy
Between 1995 and 2015 in Italy there was a 20 percentage point decrease in gas emissions, placing our country even below the European average of emissions. This remarkable result is however attributable for 75% to productive activities (and therefore to their fall due to the economic crisis) and not to sustainable initiatives. In 2017, according to the Superior Institute for Environmental Protection and Research (Ispra) data, emissions drop to 0.3%, compared to an increase in GDP of 1.5%, a sign of an effective tendency to decoupling.
Furthermore, from 2010 until today, the "natural" phenomena have affected with significant impacts (inconvenience, damage to infrastructures, victims) 198 municipalities, which have suffered 340 extreme weather phenomena.
In 2018, with the new national integrated energy and climate plan, Italy set new goals in containing emissions, but for the "carbon neutral" goal there is still a long way to go, especially as the National Plan proposal for adaptation to climate change (Pnacc) has remained at the draft stage since 2017.
Find out more about SDG 13