The generational climate fight

 

Greta Thunberg       Joe Biden

Elderly statesmen got together at a virtual summit on climate change last Thursday, April 22, Earth Day. At the same time, middle-aged politicians under the auspices of Portugal’s current presidency of the Council of the European Union were having discussions about a provisional EU climate law on a 2030 emissions target. Young activists are not impressed; there’s still far too much talk and far too little action, they say.

US President Joe Biden has proposed pouring trillions of dollars into clean-energy technology, research and infrastructure. He faces fierce opposition in doing so from Republicans who are sticking with Donald Trump’s extraordinary decision to pull out of the 2015 Paris climate accord. They insist that any transition to clean energy would put the jobs of American oil, gas and coal workers “into the shredder”. Republicans have also been castigating China as the world’s No. 1 greenhouse gas polluter. (America is the No.2).

As well intentioned as 78-year-old Joe Biden may be  to place the US among the most ambitious nations in curbing climate change by pledging to cut fossil fuel emissions by 52% by 2030, he may not be around to see that through, certainly not as president.

Addressing an online meeting of a US House of Representatives committee on fossil fuel subsidies that coincided with the virtual summit, 18-year-old Greta Thunberg as usual did not mince her words. “It is the year 2021. The fact that we are still having this discussion and even more that we are still subsidising fossil fuels directly or indirectly using taxpayers’ money, is a disgrace. It’s proof we have not understood the climate emergency at all,” she said.

The two-day summit briefly made the main headlines, which remain preoccupied with the COVID-19 pandemic and other current matters. To the mainstream media as well as politicians, the distant future is not as compelling as the here and now. 

Among those keeping an eye on the EU’s intentions on combating the existential threat to humanity are the four Portuguese children and two young adults who have filed a climate change lawsuit with the European Court of Human Rights against all 27 EU member states, plus Russia, the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Norway, the Ukraine and Turkey. Aged between eight and 21, they claim that all 33 countries are breaching their human rights by failing to make deep and urgent emission cuts, and not adequately addressing contributions to emissions released beyond borders.

The plaintiffs have personally experienced the ravages of heat waves and wildfires caused by climate change in their homeland. While supposedly protected by the European Convention on Human Rights, they say they fear for their future lives and livelihoods because of worsening climate change. The case they filed in September last year probably has a long way to go, but it has been granted priority and fast-tracked by the court in Strasbourg because of “the importance and urgency of the issues raised”.

This highly unusual court assurance has been greatly welcomed by the plaintiffs and the London-based barrister and international NGOs who are backing them. Their efforts are in harmony with many other court cases and public protests arranged by young climate activists around the world.

This is how Sweden’s Greta Thunberg put it to lawmakers in the US House of Representatives: “What I’m here to say is that unlike you my generation will not give up without a fight. And to be honest, I do not believe for a second that you will actually do this. The climate crisis doesn’t exist in the public debate today and since it doesn’t really exist and the general level of awareness is so absurdly low, you will still get away with continuing to contribute to the destruction of present and future living conditions. And I know I’m not the one who is supposed to ask questions here, but there is something I really do wonder. How long do you honestly believe that people in power like you will get away with it? How long do you think you can continue to ignore the climate crisis, the global aspect of equity and the historic emissions without being held accountable?

“You get away with it now, but sooner or later people are going to realise what you have been doing all this time. That’s inevitable. You still have time to do the right thing and save your legacy, but we know that time is not going to last for long. What happens then? We the young people are the ones who are going to write about you in history books. We are the ones who get to decide how you are remembered. So my advice for you is to choose wisely....

Thank you.”    

 

The Portuguese plaintiffs, from left to right and top to bottom: André Oliveira, Catarina Mota, Cláudia Agostinho, Mariana Agostinho, Martim Agostinho and Sofia Oliveira (Photos: Global Legal Action Network)

International travel still troubled

It was hoped there would be clarity by now on the reopening of leisure travel from the UK, but international airlines, British holidaymakers desperate to get away and the tourist industry in Portugal are all greatly frustrated by the continuing uncertainty.

The recent taskforce framework report did not reveal any clues and the British Government has not announced anything precise about when, to what destinations and under what conditions its current international leisure travel ban will be lifted after May 17.    

“Rather than answering questions, the framework leaves everyone asking more,” said Steve Heapy, the chief executive of Jet2, which normally flies holidaymakers from the UK to Lisbon, the Algarve and Madeira among other places. Jet2 has now suspended all its flights until the third week in June.

The Reuters agency reports that the bosses of all British airlines have “joined forces to urge the British government to ensure that all popular European destinations face the least onerous travel restrictions when holidays are permitted again”.

“The aviation industry is on its knees,” said the boss of Jet2, adding that under the present circumstances it was impossible for travel businesses to make proper plans.

The chief executive of easyJet, Johan Lundgren, said he could not see any problem with opening up on May 17, but the airline does not expect passenger numbers to really pick up until late May.

The best the UK transport secretary Grant Shapps has been able to divulge is that people could now “start to think” about booking summer holidays.

 The UK Government has proposed a traffic light system that will list destination countries as red, amber or green depending on COVID risk factors. The government is especially concerned about travellers returning to the UK with Covid infections, especially any new variants of the virus.

While Britain’s aviation minister says it’s too early to predict, Portugal is expected to be one of the few countries to be in the ‘green’ category, probably along with Malta, Israel and the United States. Green list passengers will probably not have to quarantine upon returning home, but they may have to show a negative Covid test result shortly before boarding flights to and from overseas destinations.

The cost of tests is causing concern as it may exceed the cost of some international flights. A pre-departure PCR test in the UK currently costs about £128.

Portugal has lifted its overseas flight ban, but special checks will be kept in place on the border with Spain at least until early May. Meanwhile, Portugal has joined several other European Union countries in moving towards a COVID-19 passport scheme and   Portugal’s secretary of state for tourism, Rita Marques, told an online conference that this country will try to avoid “at all costs” passengers having to quarantine or take more tests this summer.

While the UK is Portugal’s number one source of visitors from abroad there are frustrating doubts too about major sources within the EU, such as France and Germany where COVID infection rates have been surging recently. Each EU country has its own non-essential travel deadlines and rules.

Portugal now has among the lowest COVID rates in Europe. With the easing of lockdown restrictions here this month and next, local tourist services may have to rely for the time being on domestic visitors until international leisure travellers are allowed in, hopefully as early as possible, before spring has completely finished and before the start of a very busy summer.

Portugal tourism -what’s what?

 

There are still many complications, much confusion and lots of uncertainty, but here’s the nitty-gritty of what’s known about the prospects for tourism from abroad.

Foreign holidaymakers are expected to start arriving in Portugal in significant numbers in May and June.

The UK has long been Portugal’s biggest source of foreign visitors, but the British Government has made it clear that no holidaymakers from England will be allowed to go anywhere abroad before May 17.

Top easyJet, Ryanair and other airline officials have strongly urged the British Government to include Portugal on a proposed “Green List” of countries and allow flights  to resume on May 17. They have asked that they be informed well ahead of this date so they can properly prepare their aircraft and staff for takeoff.

EasyJet has already announced that in addition to its normal airport terminals in the UK it will open new routes to holiday hotspots from Birmingham.

The government authorities in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have yet to announce the lifting of the May 17 travel ban.

Advice on the start of international travel is expected to be contained in a report commissioned by the UK Government and due to be delivered next Monday, April 12.  

The “Green Light” category of travellers will probably only need to be able to show that they have tested negative shortly before and after international travel. They will not be required to quarantine on arrival or returning.

For visitors from Ireland, the Portuguese Government requires the following measures effective until midnight April 15:

• Have a negative / ‘not detected’ result from a pre-departure COVID-19 RT-PCR test taken within 72 hours prior to arrival in Portugal.

• Present evidence of their negative/‘not detected’ result before boarding their flight, and to Portuguese immigration officers on arrival at points of entry.

Such a scenario is less certain regarding Portugal’s other major sources of holiday visitors, particularly Germany, France and the Netherlands, which have all been described as “high risk” areas because of recent surges in Covid infections amid the European Union’s slow rollout of vaccines. 

The agreement between Portugal and Spain on the closure of their land and river borders will run at least until April 15 by which time it will be reviewed. The transportation of essential goods is among the exemptions currently in place, but cross-border leisure travel is forbidden.

Holiday travel to Portugal from the United States and Canada has yet to be given the official go-ahead. 

 All passengers travelling to the Archipelago of the Azores must fill out a questionnaire of the Regional Health Authority within 72 hours before their departure. After completing the questionnaire, they will receive a code that they must use to identify themselves upon landing.

All passengers travelling to Madeira by air must complete the "Madeira Safe to Discover" web app registration at www.madeirasafe.com in the 12 to 48 hours before departure. If they do not complete it before the flight, they will have to do so on their mobile device after landing by using the QR codes posted at the airport or by providing their data to the staff available for that purpose.

The Portuguese Government in the weeks ahead will be systematically reviewing all its current restrictions on holiday travel. Meanwhile, throughout mainland Portugal small groups may be served on outside tables in cafes and restaurants and museums have been among the facilities recently opened after two months of lockdown. The plan is to allow the reopening of restaurants indoors as well as outdoors on May 19. All stores and shopping centres as well as auditoriums and theatres will be back in business on April 19.

All sports, gyms, indoor and outdoor physical activities and other events will be permitted with reduced capacity from May 3.  

The coronavirus is not going away anytime soon and so basic rules such as the wearing of facemasks and appropriate social distancing will remain mandatory in public places throughout Portugal at least until June 13

While many Covid uncertainties remain, one thing beyond any doubt is that all sections of the Portuguese tourist industry that is so vital for this country’s economy, want to welcome with open arms any holidaymakers frustrated by lockdowns in each of their home countries.

Tourism is in limbo indefinitely

 

April 12 could be a highly significant day for Portugal's shattered tourist industry, which is desperate to welcome visitors from abroad as soon as possible. A great many of those potential visitors, who have long been living in lockdown, are desperate  to come.

On April 12 a British government taskforce will report to Prime Minister Boris Johnson with details of when and how international travel from the UK should be resumed.

The UK is Portugal’s number one source of foreign holidaymakers. So far, Prime Minister Johnson has made it clear that unessential travel from England will not be permitted before May 19. He has not yet announced when such travel will be permitted. UK Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said at the weekend that it was still “too early to tell” when holidays abroad would be allowed.

A  scientific adviser to the British government has thrown new uncertainties into the confusion by telling the BBC that allowing summer holidays abroad was “extremely unlikely” because of the risk of travellers bringing coronavirus variants back to the UK. The adviser, Dr Mike Tildesley, said: “I think we are running a real risk if we start to have lots of people going overseas in July, for instance, or August.”

British Secretary of Defence Ben Wallace seemed to back this chilling remark by saying an extension of the May 19 ban on holiday travel could not be ruled out because “we are not going to do anything that puts at risk the national effort to control this pandemic.” He added that booking a holiday now would be “premature” and “potentially risky.”  The Labour Party’s shadow foreign secretary, Lisa Nandy, says she will not be booking a holiday abroad.

In Scotland, national clinical director Professor Jason Leitch said foreign holidays in Europe were looking “less likely” as Covid numbers in some countries were “a cause for concern.”  

Of concern in Portugal also is that a third Covid wave in Germany, Poland, France and Italy could not only hold up tourism from those countries, but somehow spread with variants elsewhere in the continent.

Covid daily rates in Portugal are currently lower than at any time since early October last year. This has given rise to hope among those in the travel industry, including airlines and tour operators, that things could start improving at least by June. They will have to wait to an announcement about the April 12 report before they have a better idea of what lies ahead so far as the UK is concerned. 

For now, one good thing is that most, though not all, of the controversy over the AstraZeneca vaccine has been settled. It has been deemed   to be “safe and effective with benefits that far outweigh the risks.” As in many other EU countries, Portugal briefly suspended the administration of the AstraZeneca vaccine as a “precautionary measure” following unsubstantiated reports about the risk of lethal blood clots.

Portugal now wants to push ahead as fast as possible with as many jabs as possible. Vaccinations so far have been very slow to administer even to the elderly and most vulnerable because of insufficient deliveries of AstraZeneca, Pfizer and Moderna doses across the European continent. Millions of the single-dose Janssen vaccine are awaited from the American Johnson & Johnson corporation. 

Vaccinations rates in Portugal may remain low for weeks to come, but for now infection rates are becoming more manageable. The statistics change every day of course, but in round figures since the start of the pandemic in Portugal there have been 817,000 confirmed infection cases and just under 16,800 deaths.

The worst infected area has been in the north of the country. The most deaths have been in the Lisbon-Tagus Valley. Far, far fewer infections and deaths have been recorded in the prime holiday destinations of the Algarve and the two autonomous regions of Madeira and the Azores.

Lockdown restrictions within the country have started to be eased and will be lowered considerably on April 5, April 9 and May 3 by which time most public facilities will be open again, though with strict maximum group numbers, social distancing rules - and few if any foreign visitors in sight .  

 

Ireland, St. Patrick and Portugal

 St. Patrick’s Day, March 17, is celebrated annually around the world, including, of course, by Irish expatriates in Portugal and Portuguese living in Ireland. With traditional festivities subdued this year because of the coronavirus pandemic, it’s a good time to reflect on the close ties that have long existed between these two countries.

The Irish Embassy in Lisbon points out on its website that “Portugal is close to the top of holiday destinations for Irish people, and thousands of Portuguese people call Ireland their second home from home, as do Irish people resident in Portugal.”

The latest official number of Irish visitors to Portugal was 522,000 in 2019, an increase of about 164,500 on the previous year. Pandemic permitting, substantial numbers will be able to come later this year too.

The Embassy has arranged a number of online events as well as the flood-lighting of ten of the most imposing monuments and buildings across Portugal. It’s part of Ireland’s “Global Greening” programme.

As staunch members of the European Union, the governments in Dublin and Lisbon continue to co-operate with each other and the rest of the EU to ensure a full and sustainable recovery from the European debt crisis.

The strong bilateral economic relationship involved more than €700 million in merchandise trade in 2019. Another example of co-operation was the recent launching of a cargo ferry service between Dublin and Leixões, a major seaport near Oporto. A range of Irish firms also operate in the services  sector with 120 companies as members of the Ireland Portugal Business Network  (IPBN).

Personal and trade ties go back a very, very long way – to many hundreds of years before St. Patrick came on to the scene n the 4^th century.

Historians believe that Celtic people who had migrated to the Iberian Peninsula in two big waves, around 900 BC and again 700 – 600 BC,  travelled to Ireland to join other Celts who had emigrated there from mainland Europe in the Iron Age beginning around 500 BC.

St. Patrick, an atheist in his youth, converted to Catholicism in Roman times and then set out to convert the pagans in what fifteen or sixteen centuries later would become the Republic of Ireland. Other missionaries were doing the same at about the same time in what would eventually become the Republic of Portugal. Roman Catholicism is still the predominate religion in both countries.

Much has changed since the distant past, of course, but St. Patrick’s Day is normally celebrated with vigour throughout the island of Ireland, that’s to say in Northern Ireland as well as the Republic. St. Patrick’s grave is said to be on a hillside just outside the small northern town of Downpatrick.

Their geographical position on the western edge of continental Europe encouraged trade between Ireland and Portugal to increase during medieval times. The Irish imported such commodities as wine, silver, textiles, ceramics and leather. The Portuguese imported mainly salted fish, beef, wool and timber.

Cultural and intellectual influences grew from the 16^th to 18^thcenturies when Irish scholars went to study at the universities in Évora, Coimbra and Lisbon. In the 18^th and 19^th centuries several influential Irish families settled in Portugal and descendants remain here today.

The island of Ireland is smaller with a population half that of Portugal, but a mutual feeling of friendship and respect endures nowadays with the convergence of political and diplomatic interests within the Eurozone.

St. Patrick's Day 'greening' in Lisbon

Golf could lead tourism revival

There are signs that the golfing sector, an integral part of Portugal’s vital tourism industry, may bounce back dramatically after Covid restrictions are eased and international flights resumed.

The pandemic has impacted heavily on the many golf resorts in the Algarve and elsewhere in the country. All of the courses are currently closed. Associated hotels are virtually empty as their restaurants, bars and other facilities are in lockdown. A reopening date has yet to be announced.

It’s generally recognised that golf is a sport that has been, and can continue to be, played safely during the Covid crisis.

The chief executive of the Portuguese Golf Federation has written to the minister of sport requesting the reopening of the golf clubs and explained how safe golf is with the necessary precautions in place. Players can easily keep the required distance and holes on the greens have been adjusted so no one touches the flags.

Even so, holiday golfers from the UK, a major tourist market, may not be permitted by the UK government to travel internationally before May 17.

In Spain, where the Covid-19 infection and death rates have been very high, golf courses have remained open even though the borders have been closed between Spain, Portugal and France.

The courses in Scotland have remained open too, while those in the rest of the United Kingdom have been closed since early January this year. English courses can reopen from March 29. An announcement about closed courses in Wales is expected on March 12 and the situation in Northern Ireland is to be reviewed on March 19.

A survey of 200 golf clubs in the UK concluded that 80 percent of them had a rise in membership last year, and more than a third of these reported a “dramatic” rise in membership. Despite - or because of the pandemic - nearly half of the clubs surveyed said they had an increase in green fee revenue and 33 percent said rounds were up “significantly” on the previous year.  

Meanwhile, an “invasion” of holidaying golfers and their families is predicted in Portugal when international travel bans are lifted. Although mid-May  approaches the end of the traditional spring golf season in this country, if the UK government lifts travel restrictions around then it will be welcome, particularly in the Algarve in the run-up  to the crowded summer ‘sun and sand’ holidays.

Furthermore, the mid-February to May and September to mid-November golf seasons have been edging longer. This has encouraged more visits by families in which not all members play golf.

Another reason for optimism is that many potential visitors from abroad are simply fed up of living in lockdown and are anxious to get away. Far more of them in the UK than anywhere else are ready to do just that because they have already been vaccinated or are in line to have their jabs fairly soon. So, let’s see what happens in May if not before.

It’s not yet clear if the Portugal Masters, a PGA European Tour event and the biggest annual competition in the country’s golfing calendar, will be able to go ahead as scheduled at the Dom Pedro Course at Vilamoura in the Algarve from 28^th April to 2^nd May.

If the Masters does take place as scheduled, even without the usual big, live crowd of spectators present, it will spark interest internationally as it’s a top professional event televised and watched across the world, giving the Algarve good publicity as a tourist destination.  

Golf has been fundamental to tourism in Portugal since the entrepreneur John Stilwell and his friend and famed golf champion Henry Cotton developed and opened the Algarve’s first 18-hole course next to the Penina Hotel in 1966. Today, there are 46 full-length or nine-hole courses located from east to west across the region. The Lisbon area has 25, Porto 10, Madeira five and the Azores three.  

Every one of them is eagerly awaiting as many players as soon as possible - and so is the rest of the tourist industry.

 

 

Climate change: leaders call for urgent action to save humanity

 

Since taking over the presidency of the Council of the European Union from Germany at the start of this year, Portugal has emphasised that climate change is “an existential threat to humanity” and has given the subject top priority in the run-up to November’s crucial United Nations COP-26 summit in Glasgow.

At a meeting entitled Climate Change – New Economic Models organised by the EU Council last Friday, the Portuguese minister for the environment and climate action, João Pedro Matos Fernandes, told participants that “Portugal was the first country in the world to commit itself to carbon neutrality and it firmly believes that we can only create value and grow the economy within the limits of the natural system.”

The minister went on to say that “Europe underscored just this with the EU Green Deal. The investment in sustainability is essential to an improvement in the conditions of the planet and to economic growth.”

Frans Timmermans, the executive vice-president of the European Union, said at Friday’s conference: “the climate and biodiversity crises threaten – without any exaggeration – our very survival”.

In a recorded statement, Timmermans said that “even though the pandemic still dominates our daily lives, Europeans still strongly – and increasingly – support climate and environmental action”.

On the current situation, Timmermans emphasised that “the pandemic has taught us a harsh lesson about how our own health and wellbeing are depend on that of the planet.”

He said he fully agreed with a statement by the former Portuguese prime minister and now secretary-general of the United Nations, António Guterres, that “making peace with nature is the defining task of the 21st century,” adding that “we have just a limited number of years left to avoid causing ecocide”.

Portugal’s current prime minister, António Costa, noted last week that Europe had made a commitment to be the first carbon-neutral continent by 2050, and that this is the “core aspect of the vision enshrined in the European Green Deal, which establishes a new development strategy for Europe and a roadmap for making Europe sustainable.”

The EU Council is aiming to pass an EU 2030 climate target into law by June this year. This would include the bloc’s plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55% by 2030.

On Wednesday last week, the renowned ecologist and broadcaster Sir David Attenborough said in an impassioned address to the United Nations Security Council: “please make no mistake, climate change is the biggest threat to security modern humans have ever faced.”

In Sir David’s words, “if we continue on our current path we will face the collapse of everything that gives us our security: food production, access to fresh water, habitable ambient temperature, and ocean food chains. And if the natural world can no longer support the most basic of our needs, then most of the rest of civilisation will quickly break down.”

There were, however, some grounds for hope, said Sir David. “While it’s true we can never go back to the stable, benign climate that enabled us to flourish for the past 10,000 years, I do believe that if we do act fast enough, we can reach a new stable state.”

As Sir David pointed out, there are obvious signs that global warming is already causing events with disastrous consequences: “Continents are on fire. Glaciers are melting. Coral reefs are dying. Fish are disappearing from our oceans. The list goes on and on.”

The United States climate envoy, John Kerry, told the Security Council that the United Nations COP-26 summit would be, “our last best hope to get on track and get this right.”

John Kerry continued: “we are now compelled to do more than talk about climate-related security risks. We have to work together to understand them before they wreak havoc; we have to develop stronger early-warning systems; we have to mainstream the climate crisis into every aspect of our public and private sector and decision-making. And in the face of climate-fuelled challenges, we have to make certain that cooperation, not conflict, is the response of first resort.”

Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft and billionaire philanthropist, said in a recent BBC interview that solving the Corvid-19 pandemic would be “very, very easy” compared to solving climate change, which, if successful, would be “the most amazing thing humanity has ever done.”

The challenge of avoiding a global warming disaster should not be underestimated, he said. “We've never made a transition like we're talking about doing in the next 30 years. There is no precedent for this.”

Climate activists agree that one essential reform to be made by the nations of the world is to stop dumping 56 billion tons of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere each year. Net zero is where we need to get to. So far we have some, but not all, the ways of doing that.

The biggest polluters are China, which annually releases more than 10 billion tons of CO2 into the atmosphere, followed by the United States (5.4 billion tons) and India (2.6 billion tons). The biggest CO2 polluter in the European Union is Germany with about 760 million tons.

Serious steps to tackle climate change only really began with a treaty signed in 1992 at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro organised by the the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

This was followed in 1997 by the signing of the Kyoto Protocol, which entered into force in 2005.

The biggest step taken by the UNFCCC so far has been the Paris Agreement signed by 196 countries in 2016. Its main goal remains the same today: to keep the increase in global average temperature to well below 2 °C (3.6 °F) above pre-industrial levels, and if possible to limit the increase to 1.5 °C (2.7 °F).  

The Paris Agreement broadly rests on the understanding that keeping long-term temperature in check and reducing greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible will substantially reduce the risks and impacts of climate change. Each signatory to the Paris Agreement is expected to determine, plan, and regularly report on its contribution.  

The next major UNFCCC gathering, scheduled for November in Glasgow, may well be absolutely pivotal. It’s an event Portugal and the European Council are very much preparing for.

Sir David Attenborough

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MaweqwsN62k

Bill Gates video:

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-56042029