Russian Elite Increasingly Dominated by People who Don’t Think Climate Change is an Immediate Challenge, Tananayev Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 10 – Russian elites, both political and academic, are not focusing on the threat of climate change because an increasing number of them believe that there will be a cooling trend over the next decade and so policy makers can forget about any longer term consequences, Nikita Tananayev says.

            The head of the laboratory studying climate change in the North-East University in Yakutsk says that this point of view exists “among decision makers” and therefore “Russia is not devoting sufficient attention to the struggle with climate change” (kedr.media/podcast/izmeneniya-klimata-dlya-narodov-yakutii-neblagopriyatny-uchenyj-o-globalnom-poteplenii-v-sibiri-5272).

            Tananayev makes this point in the course of a discussion about the situation in Sakha. That republic, he points out, “is not only the coldest and biggest region in the world; it is also the place where climate changes be they rising temperatures or the melting of the eternal permafrost is felt most clearly.”

            He says that global warming is hitting the indigenous population there especially hard and that if nothing is done quickly, their way of life and survival as distinct peoples will be at risk in the near future.