Drought and Floods: our responsibility

Adaptive management techniques for drought in South America, extreme precipitation in West Africa with disaster relief agencies: soap, blankets, visas to cross boundaries: launched plans 6 wks before floods rather than after calamity. Red Cross/ Red Crescent co-ordination to dialog with forecasters.

Recommendations:

Create climate sensitive societies
Accelerated urgency requires working together

ACMAD (www.acmad.org) since 1987 responding to Africa droughts (African Center for Meteorological Development) despite minimal planning (presenter delayed in security line, being represented by another panelist).

Obviously, more & more in COP15, I'm seeing that agencies, scientists & volunteers are doing lots about adaptation. But what is emerging more & more is the self- centered apathy of many individuals in the Northern developed countries about demanding legal, regulatory changes. Policy makers can't be blamed any more if the electorates doesn't care and make their concerns known to legislators.

Gaps need to be bridged between people on ground & policy makers. Some case studies encouraging but big divide remains. What is the actionable strategy to get the best results? How prioritize research? How to make allocations? Co-ordinated action can reach scale (as usual, art not included).

Asked why, when discussion is about outreach, there isn't more outreach to contemporary artists, who are very concerned about these issues and can do this bridging of gaps? Response from Italian- engaging a filmmaker from NYU, Parsons School of Design. Pablo Suarez, from red Cross, said, "we have no $ but would be interested in what you'd propose."