(^16) Introduction - Climate Change and the Challenge for Human Development in Croatia Human Development Report - Croatia 2008
reduce emissions from transportation and reduce de-
forestation. Discussions on climate change lead to the
question of how much society should focus on adapt-
ing to climate change versus mitigating the GHG emis-
sions that lead to climate change (See Box 1-1).
What is Croatia’s role in addressing climate change?
As a democratic country that emerged from the for-
mer Yugoslavia in the early 1990s, Croatia underwent
a period of economic and social upheaval, including a
shift from a socialist economy to capitalism, a war, and
Box 1-1: Moral dimension of mitigation vs. adaptation
Addressing climate change as an issue of human
security raises many questions and concerns about
the capacity of societies to respond to current and
future change in a thoughtful and ethical manner.
One of many questions put forward is: Should we
focus on slowing future climate warming by re-
ducing emissions through mitigation measures or
focus on adapting to future climate warming, or
both? Whether we choose to invest time, money
and energy into mitigation vs. adaptation strategies
- reducing greenhouse gas emissions or develop-
ing technologies to adapt to climate change - will
raise social and political questions that cannot be
answered in a simple manner.
Greenhouse gases do not remain where they are
released; they disperse throughout the atmosphere
around the world. A tonne of GHG is a tonne of GHG,
no matter where it comes from.
In practice, however, climate change does not
harm everyone equally. Its costs fall most heavily
on vulnerable people – particularly upon vulner-
able people in poorer countries. These vulnerable
populations will tend to be the least able to adapt
to changes in the climate. Further, the costs will be
borne by future generations, which will inherit the
planet the current generation helps to form. For this
reason, there is a moral imperative to mitigate the
effects of climate change by reducing emissions.
We need to contrast mitigation with adaptation.
Adaptation measures have local impacts. Shifting
to agricultural techniques that save water helps
both the farmers and the population purchasing
the food. Resettling a group of people away from
a coastline benefits that group of people. Altering
fishing practices to adjust to changing fish popula-
tions helps fishermen.
While it might be nice to think that there are
enough resources to address both mitigation and
adaptation, this is unlikely to be the case. However,
we must work to do both. We must reduce emis-
sions in order to ensure that climate change does
not threaten human development and our environ-
mental resources. Further, we must adapt to exist-
ing and future climate change in a way that helps
protect people in Croatia from the dangers imposed
by climate change.
Much of what we do in terms of mitigation will also
serve the goal of adaptation. In a way, mitigation
itself can be seen as a kind of adaptation. Moving
away from centralised energy based on fossil fu-
els towards de-centralised renewable energy and
greater community self-sufficiency will make our
society more flexible and resilient, not only in terms
of physical infrastructure and settlement patterns,
but also in terms of governing institutions and cul-
tural habits.
To address the problems created because of global
climate change, we need to pay attention to both
adaptation and mitigation. Further knowledge
about the costs and benefits of adaptation and mit-
igation measures will be necessary in order to make
the right choices so that human development is not
hurt by climate change.Dr. Sc. Daniel R. Schneider, Assistant Minister, Direc-
torate for Environmental Management, Ministry of
Environmental Protection, Physical Planning and
Construction of the Republic of Croatia