Asia Is Heating Up Faster Than The Global Average, UN Report Says

The United Nations weather agency said Asia was the region most affected by climate change, weather, and water-related risks worldwide.

According to a report released by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), floods and storms were the leading causes of deaths and economic damage in 2023, while the impact of heatwaves became more severe.

Natural Disasters And Extreme Heat

The report stated that temperatures in Asia were 0.91 degrees Celsius above the 1991-2020 reference period last year, the second highest on record. In addition, 2023 was the warmest year in Japan and Kazakhstan.

An unprecedented heatwave raced throughout the continent in April and May, bringing record-breaking temperatures to Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand. While a period of high heat is usually uncommon before the rainy season begins, the severity of last year's heatwave, which broke all prior records, was unprecedented.

China also faced searing weather over the summer, with the mercury in the capital, Beijing, exceeding 40 degrees Celsius for weeks and even reaching 52.2 degrees Celsius in the northwest province of Xinjiang.

A marine heatwave in 2023 caused sea surface temperatures in the Arctic Ocean to reach a record high. According to the report, places such as the Arabian Sea, the southern Kara Sea, and the southeastern Laptev Sea are seeing sea surface warming at a rate more than three times faster than the global average.

The agency said 79 incidents involving water-related weather hazards were documented across Asia last year. Floods and storms accounted for around 80% of these, killing almost 2,000 people and directly affecting nine million others.

According to the State of the Climate in Asia 2023 report, floods were the greatest cause of death in documented incidents in 2023, "by a significant margin."

Hong Kong recorded 158.1mm of rain in one hour on September 7, the most since records began in 1884, as a result of a typhoon.

Terrific Wake-Up Call

The WMO stated that national weather services across Asia must urgently improve tailored information for officials working to reduce disaster risks.

According to Peter Newman, a sustainability professor at Curtin University, climate change is a "war that we are inducing onto ourselves," and the globe is in the midst of a climatic catastrophe that is projected to worsen until net zero emissions are fully implemented.

"If we can do that by 2040, for example, then immediately, we would start to get on top of it all, but until then we are going to have to expect more damage from floods, fires and all kinds of weather changes," he said.

He described the recent floods in Asia as a "terrific wake-up call," noting that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, of which he is a coordinating lead author, has been expecting changes for some time, but that they have "come sooner than we thought."

The study follows the publication of the WMO's annual State of the Climate in Europe report in partnership with the EU's flagship Earth Observation Programme, Copernicus, which revealed a similarly gloomy picture of the continent's increasing climate disaster.