UNEP chief counts the environmental cost of conflictーNHK WORLD-JAPAN NEWS

Added: 2026-05-23

[00:00:00]The conflict in the Middle East has come at a heavy cost to civilians, but also to the environment. Some of the effects like oil spills and air pollution have been immediate. Others could persist for decades to come. To learn more about the environmental impact of war, my colleague Kume Ayako spoke with Inger Andersen, the executive director of the United Nations Environment Program or UNEP.

[00:00:25]Hello. Hello. Hi. Hi.

[00:00:28]As the head of UNEP, Andersen has worked on issues including climate change, biodiversity loss, and environmental pollution, while calling on countries around the world to take action.

[00:00:41]First, I'd like to ask about the environmental impact of the armed conflict in the Middle East.

[00:00:48]Well, there's a study which says more than 5 million tons of greenhouse gases were emitted within just 2 weeks since the start of the conflict back in February and March.

[00:01:00]Well, how do you assess the environmental impact of this conflict in the Middle East? We can't say for sure because we haven't been there to make these observations, but clearly where the bombing is the most intense is where the environmental damage is the most intense. Often in conflict, then the normal services stop. Sewerage may not work.

[00:01:22]So, diseases happen or the land gets inundated with fecal matter.

[00:01:28]Or solid waste is not collected.

[00:01:31]And it piles up. Our concern is that this goes into the environment, goes into the water, goes into and can potentially cause long-term pollution, toxicity, and other impacts that can damage wildlife as well as fauna. So, this is really a concern that we very much hold. Over what time frame might might these impact persist? Even when the guns have fallen silent, the environment is still sick often for many years. The pollution can travel over long distance carried by the winds, but also of course carried into into future. It depends very much what it is.

[00:02:15]If we were talking about a chemical factory that could have been hit, which we have seen in other wars, it can forever poison the water indeed.

[00:02:26]The First World War, if we go back that far, 100 years plus, there is still farmland in areas of where the intensity of the conflict was so intense that the land is completely you can't pull a plow over it because it's pockmarked from the trench warfare.

[00:02:44]And so the reality is that war is a destroyer of the environment.

[00:02:50]War is taking a toll on an environment that is already under increasing stress due to climate change. What can we do to protect it?

[00:03:00]In 2015, leaders signed the landmark Paris Agreement pledging efforts to limit global warming to less than 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.

[00:03:12]But last November, UNEP announced that average global temperatures are projected to rise between 2.3 and 2.5° by the end of this century.

[00:03:24]You've consistently called on countries around the world to take action at various forums, international forums, but the United States has withdrawn from the Paris Agreement, unfortunately, and conflicts continue in various regions.

[00:03:38]We're similarly accelerating trends that run counter to climate action.

[00:03:42]Um, how do you view this current situation?

[00:03:45]Well, first of all, of course, we very much regret that one country stepped out, but we also take note that all other countries are still at the table. We need to continue to stretch our efforts um to reach 1.5 to to to get to the 1.5, we we need to make considerable cuts, and of course even and that's where we from UNEP will continue to push.

[00:04:11]That still is achievable.

[00:04:14]Achievable with extraordinary efforts.

[00:04:17]We would need to make a reduction of 55% between now and 2035 in our CO2 emissions to land on 1.5. So, achievable, yes, with extraordinary effort. If we want to land on 2°, then we need to make a reduction of 30-some percent by 2035. Still a massive effort. Those who live close to forest fires, uh those who live with glaciers and depend on glacier water for their water supply, glaciers are melting, and protect their people, to provide greater resilience in the case of fires, droughts, and floods, and to ensure that the disease burden that often come with hotter temperatures can be managed. And so, these are all the issues that we need to be very careful attending to. It is true that we are set to We have about 8 million species on this planet. And if we continue as we are, we're set to lose 1 million by 2100.

[00:05:20]And so, people might think, well, one one fly, one orchid, one insect, what does it matter? But it matters because nature is a very finely inter- Everything depends on everything.

[00:05:34]Uh everything is connected.

[00:05:36]And so, when we protect ecosystem, we are protecting nature, and we are protecting ourselves.

[00:05:44]Climate change and environmental pollution um has been long marked by conflicts of interest between, you know, the developed and developing countries, oil producing and non-producing nations.

[00:05:55]And in a situation like that, in this context, what role do you think Japan should play in the future?

[00:06:03]I think what I would ask Japan to do is lean in on multilateral negotiations, as you are doing, but take industry with you because industry is an innovator and they imagine things that we couldn't imagine and then they invented in technology and so on will be part of the solution and when industry leans in and says we can make changes in how we deal with packaging, how we deal plastic, how we deal with conveying our products. Are you optimistic in the future that our globe our world will be even better maybe in the future? You know, I am determined.

[00:06:47]This is what I am and I when I see young people they are determined, too, and that is what gives me optimism.

[00:06:57]Because young people know.

[00:07:00]They know what needs to happen and they are determined. They study, they start companies, they are active in their faith. It doesn't matter where they go.

[00:07:11]Each of these are the signals that science and the earth is sending us.

[00:07:18]And so I I have to say that yes the glass is not full, it's half full.

[00:07:24]Some people say it's half empty. We have to make sure that we keep that determination to fill it up.