Ahead of the G8

An excellent article today in the Independent (here) points out that you cannot talk about improving conditions in Africa in economic terms alone. Africa is already a "difficult" place to live in, and climate change will only make it harder. And while I'm still a fierce critic of Tony Blair, I applaud the three aims he has for climate change at the G8: get a global acceptance that climate change is real, caused by human action and an urgent threat; start pushing business to developing low-carbon technologies; and finally getting agreements in place with developing countries (including China and India) to grow their economies the low-carbon way. Let us hope Blair is able to achieve these things, as I would be more than happy for history to remember him as the man who finally woke the world up to the dangers of global warming than the idiot who runs errands for Bush and who rules in an increasingly authoritarian manner.

Another snippet of good news on this front: it appears that key people in the US - namely the evangelical right-wingers - are waking up to the dangers of climate change. Read all about it in today's Guardian here, and pray - if you'll excuse the pun - that Bush and his country wake up to the facts and their responsibility to act along with the rest of us...