Climate Impacts Are Going to Hit the Developing World Hardest, IPCC Says

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the world's leading climate science body, declared in a new report that global warming is wreaking havoc "on all continents and across the oceans," with the worst yet to come. But, by far, the most severe impacts will strike the poorest countries that bear little or no historical responsibility for causing climate change, the report said.

"Those countries who have contributed least to the manifestation of this problem are in jeopardy of being the most vulnerable to it," said Gary Yohe, an economist at Wesleyan University and a coordinating lead author of the IPCC report. "The poor, the young, the old and the people who live along the coasts will be hit the hardest."

The message of "climate justice" comes through in the 2,500 pages of the IPCC's new report released on Monday in Japan. The hot-button concept frames global warming as an ethical issue and involves developed nations financing poor nations' climate-related losses, damage and adaptation efforts.

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