El Nino worsens man-made calamity in SE Asian region

The Jakarta Post Asia correspondent Harvey Stockwin takes a look at the far flung climatic and environment changes that may result from the 1997-1998 El Nino weather effect. He suggests that while knowledge about the phenomenon is increasing, action to counter its impact is lacking, as El Nino is wrongly blamed for manmade folly.

HONG KONG (JP): American pop-star Michael Jackson has reportedly postponed a planned tour of some Southeast and East Asian countries for at least six months.

In the western U.S. state of Arizona locals recently ceased to breathe in dry desert air and instead combated heavy rains and floods.

In remote West Irian, at least 462 Papuans have reportedly died as a result of drought, and Australians will soon start an emergency airlift to 90,000 others who are threatened.

The usual bumper harvest of anchovies will not be awaiting Peruvian fishermen off shore in the next few months -- they will have to go much further into the Pacific Ocean for their reduced catch.

Faraway from the eastern Pacific, rains in India and even in Africa could be far less than normal in the next twelve months, radically reducing crop prospects.

In the seaside Mexican resort of Acapulco, the poor people have been picking themselves up after enduring a savage typhoon, the like of which the do not normally experience.

Here in Hong Kong, by contrast, the rains have been exceptionally heavy, but, so far, there have been no typhoons in 1997's typhoon season.

These are but some of the consequences which are flowing, and are likely to flow, from the increasing size of the big white blotch shown in colored satellite pictures of the eastern-central Pacific Ocean.

The satellite pictures were made available this past week at an emergency conference in California, of sufficient importance that Vice-President Al Gore took time off from defending himself in the Donategate Scandal in Washington in order to address it.

The expanding white blotch meant that the area of unusually warm water in the eastern Pacific is still dramatically expanding in size.

That fact carries a grave message to the meteorological experts, and a dire warning for the rest of us, -- this could easily be the worst El Nino weather effect certainly since 1982- 1983, and possibly of the century.

It is called El Nino no because it was first noticed, and felt, by the Catholic Peruvians as their anchovy harvest failed to materialize some years around Christmas, when El Nino (The Boy Child) was born.

Normally the eastern half of the huge island of New Guinea, Indonesia's West Irian, never lacks for plenty of rain. But as a presumed result of this year's El Nino it has been already without it for five months.

Probably there are some massive forest fires burning in West Irian as a consequence. But since West Irian attracts little attention and fewer visitors, the outside world has not heard much about them.

The West Irian drought has caused El Nino's largest direct reported casualty list so far, although the typhoon which brought massive mud slides coursing through Acapulco may have caused more deaths than has been officially admitted. But these are the early days of the 1997-1998 El Nino. Planet Earth may get some nastier surprises before it is done.

It is already receiving one. Despite ups and downs, clear skies competing with still frequent smog, The Great Southeast Asian Pollution Haze still settles over much of the region.

No doubt the teenage fans of Jackson will regard the postponement of his plans for touring the region, as a result of the great pollution haze, as a truly great misfortune in itself. "Jacko" evidently promises to think about rescheduling the trip next spring on the assumption that The Great Pollution Haze will have subsided by then. Thanks to El Nino that calculation could be too optimistic.

Perhaps, by then, the haze will have lessened in the cities in which Jackson is likely to strut his stuff. But the impact of the haze will certainly still be devastating Indonesian's health.

Many areas of the islands of Sumatra and Kalimantan have been choking for two months or more as an area of at least 800,000 hectares has been cleared by the simple cheap expedient of burning. The number of those suffering respiratory ailments must have rocketed. Conceivably, for those already suffering from asthma, the death toll has already exceeded that in West Irian or Acapulco. Yet there is too little urgency in the face of this man-made calamity.

The burning is being done by both the poor and the weak as well as the rich and powerful. Nowadays, there are plenty of other ways of clearing forest. Of course, they can be expensive, especially when tree- and earth-moving machines are required. The poor cannot afford them. The rich certainly can, even if it diminishes their profit margins. Yet there is insufficient care being taken in the face of this man-made calamity.

The haze still creates a great semi-circle of diminished economic activity and hazardous breathing in a huge semi-circle from Southern Thailand to the Southern Philippines. I have been able to watch it grow and expand in the satellite pictures freely observable on the Internet. Just as the anyone can watch El Nino grow and expand thanks to other satellite images. Yet there is insufficient awareness by governments in the face of this man- made calamity.

Amazingly, some powerful people have blamed El Nino itself as the direct cause of the haze and the calamity. But as the number of regional fires, seen by satellite, jumped from under 40 to 62 last week, the rich and powerful were obviously trying to take advantage of the fact that El Nino has delayed the rains which will halt their land-clearing. There is insufficient concern and responsibility being demonstrated in recognition that this is a man-made calamity.

The scientific knowledge is there to understand better what may afflict the Pacific region. The political will to do so is certainly lacking. It is a terrible warning not just to Southeast Asia but to planet earth itself. Nations can ignore pollution only at their peril. But that is what they are doing.