Thirty seven years ago, on this day, October 17th, 1987, in Vancouver, a Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting took place, and other leaders (especially the small island states) tried to bend UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s ear on the problem of climate change.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 349ppm. As of 2024 it is 422ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that since 1985, scientists have been trying to warn politicians. Low lying nations and so forth were paying attention because they could see the writing on the wall or the waves washing over the seawall. And Thatcher by her own account, copped an earful at this Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting. For all the good it did – it would be almost another year before she would give her speech at the Royal Society
What we learn is that you have to tell ideologues the same thing many many times before they’ll pay any attention. And God what a stupid species we are.
What happened next? Yeah, you’ve got the explosion of interest in 1988.
In 1989, the CHOGM lot received Martin Holdgate’s report, which had been commissioned at Vancouver.
Shridath Ramphal, then Secretary-General of the Commonwealth, who commissioned the report from an international expert group at the Commonwealth Heads of Government summit in Vancouver, Canada, in 1987, described the threat of climate change in his foreword as “truly global in its implications”.
He said: “If the Earth is to warm by even the most modest of the various projections, there could be far reaching, long term implications for natural ecological systems, farming, the design of major energy and water projects and for low lying areas that could be affected by rising sea level.”
The Holdgate report called for a “major international initiative” to establish “global responsibilities” for preventing unmanageable rises in the world’s temperature. It also spelt out practical steps which poor and small countries like Guyana, Bangladesh, Maldives, and Pacific islands, could take to monitor their changing environment.
You’ve got the November 1989 Male declaration about sea level rise. You then have the toothless 1992 UNFCCC (the climate treaty).
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.
Also on this day:
October 17, 1973 – the coup at the Australian Conservation Foundation
October 18, 1973 – “how on earth do you stop using fossil fuels?”