On Friday, climate experts convened by the UN released the fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which provides "unequivocal" evidence that human activity is driving climate change. Despite the weight of evidence and the report's high profile release, concerns are growing about the commitment of those in influential positions to averting climate catastrophe.

The IPCC report was compiled by 259 scientists from 39 countries. The report will be formally released on Monday 30th September, following a week of discussion and debate between experts and representatives of national governments in Stockholm, Sweden. 

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IPCC scientists revealed that greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere and average surface temperatures have increased over the past 60 years (in fact, each of the last three decades has been significantly warmer than all preceding decades since at least 1850), and that oceans have also warmed. They found that permafrost, glaciers and ice sheets in the Northern Hemisphere are all retreating, sea levels are projected to rise and rainfall will become harder to predict as changes take effect. 

Thomas Stocker, Co-Chair of the IPCC working group that produced the report, stated on Friday, "As a result of our past, present and expected future emissions of CO2, we are committed to climate change, and effects will persist for many centuries even if emissions of CO2 stop." The effects of climate change will hit those in developing countries hardest.

Agriculture is believed to be responsible for around a third of total global greenhouse gas emissions. In its latest report, said to be the most detailed on the subject, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation claims that livestock production alone accounts for "14.5 percent of all human-caused GHG releases."

FAO said last week that emissions created by animal agriculture could be cut by as much as 30 percent, through wider adoption of existing best practices and technologies, given the political will, better policies and cooperation from leaders in the sector to help drive change.

NFU claims farmers already 'part of the solution' to climate change

Reacting to the IPCC report, the UK National Farmers Union claimed that "Farmers in Britain are already providing part of the solution to the growing threat of climate change." NFU pointed out that the agriculture sector is on track to meet its GHG emission reduction target for 2020.

However, analysis of the sector's progress, released by Defra in November, paints a worrying picture. Based on available knowledge and the limitations of current farming practices, GHG reductions from agriculture are set to slow dramatically over the coming decades; government reviewers warned in November that, "in the longer term agriculture as a share of the wider carbon economy is likely to increase and potentially exceed 20% of UK wide GHG emissions by 2050 compared to around 9% today."

Experts have therefore called for more research into sustainable farming techniques and for a fundamental shift towards lower impact methods, a greater focus on horticulture and more socially just production, which will secure long-term food security. On Friday, NFU limited its calls to appealing for more investment and government support for agriculture.

NFU President Peter Kendall commented, "Agriculture is already making great strides in meeting its voluntary environmental goals, through improved resource use efficiency and innovations such as precision farming. In 2012, we saw what misery extreme weather can wreak on farmers and the food supply chain and how farm policy needs to increase our resilience. Even this year's English wheat harvest is set to be one of the smallest in over a decade, showing again that our industry is in the front line of climate-related impacts."

He continued, "To meet this challenge there is a need for investment in inputs, infrastructure, improved skills and innovations derived from research, to drive rural growth and diversification." The union leader also said the NFU is committed to a course of sustainable intensification (a controversial new concept, which in theory means seeking ways of producing more food while reducing the impact of agriculture on the environment).

In some areas, the NFU has a chequered track record when it comes to protecting Earth's natural resources. The union has consistently opposed policy measures it regards as "gold plating," from 'greening' measures intended to reduce agriculture's footprint under the reformed EU Common Agricultural Policy, to moves to strengthen water protection through expansion of Nitrate Vulnerable Zones.  

Given the seriousness of the threat and the IPCC scientists' stark warnings, some have argued that radical measures must be taken to face up to climate change. The European Green Party pointed out on Monday that, as a consensus making body, the IPCC has been deliberately cautious in many of its estimates.

Individual scholars, such as Lord Nichlas Stern, author of the influential Stern review, have pointed out more clearly how an increase of 3-4 degrees to the global average temperature would create a very different climate system to the one in which human civilization has developed. Unless mitigation strategies are undertaken swiftly, 3-4 degree warming within this century is a real possibility.

The greens want to see fundamental changes in areas of life that are contributing to pollution. "We know that the primary cause of global warming is from burning fossil fuels. The sooner we move to limit carbon pollution by switching to clean, renewable energy and to more sustainable practices in all sectors (agriculture, transport, manufacturing, etc.) the more likely it is that we will avoid the worst impacts of climate change," the party said in a statement.

Nevertheless, the response to climate science from some in positions of power has caused grave and widespread concern. Newly elected Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, who has dismissed climate science as "absolute crap", abolished the country's Climate Commission on 19^th September (the six experts who make up the Climate Commission announced last week that they will continue to work voluntarily for the new, community-funded Climate Commission, relaying information from future climate reports to the Australian public).

Environment secretary "rather relieved" by IPCC report

In June, the use of oft-debunked myths during a BBC Radio 4 debate fuelled speculation that UK Environment Secretary Owen Paterson may be a climate change 'sceptic'. Paterson's assertion in July that climate change could provide lucrative "business opportunities" for UK companies, which he repeated at the Tory party conference in Manchester over the weekend, attracted wholesale condemnation.

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Speaking in Manchester on Sunday, Paterson displayed a misunderstanding of the nuances of climate science when he reported that "the climate has been changing for centuries" and referred to "a really quite modest increase" in mean world temperature identified by the IPCC report. Although the secretary of state may be right that climate change in the UK will make production of certain crops possible at higher latitudes, he is dead wrong in his assumption that changing conditions will be a boon for food producers; higher concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, shifting rainfall patterns and the spread of pests and diseases into new regions, as well as impacts on plants and wildlife, which will not be able to adapt to new conditions rapidly enough, will all affect the productivity of agriculture, even in developed countries such as our own.

This view of climate change, narrowed to its immediate effects on Britain, or other less vulnerable countries, is in no way defensible - the effects of our current course of action will carry a real cost for future generations in the Northern hemisphere, and are already taking a toll on people in the Global South. According to the World Health Organisation, "Climatic changes already are estimated to cause over 150,000 deaths annually," the vast majority of these deaths are in developing countries.

Over 250 of the world's leading scientists, with the backing of more than 1,000 expert reviewers, have this week made one thing abundantly clear – anthropogenic climate change is a reality and immediate action is essential to address this unprecedented threat to our collective wellbeing.