Vietnam on league table of top-five countries effected by climate change

We fly into Hue, Vietnam. A lot of foreign tourists are on the flight and I wonder what they’ll see during their visit to Vietnam, and what they’ll see of the disaster. I can’t help but think that that they are likely to see less and less of Vietnam each year as the impact of climate change and sea level rise takes its toll.

Vietnam always gets a top-5 placing in “most likely to be impacted by climate change” lists. Not the sort of league table you want to be top of.

I have to travel a lot to do my job. By flying I am part of changing our climate and making the planet warmer. There’s been some discussion about whether Typhoon Ketsana is a climate change disaster. It’s hard to be categorical but I hope people around the world will be drawing their own conclusions and thinking about how we can reduce our reliance on oil, learn to adapt to more disasters and cope with scarce supplies of food and water.

The most important thing I can contribute is to make sure we have strong local teams in countries like Vietnam that are well prepared for disasters. We’re doing OK but Typhoon Ketsana is being described as the worst disaster in Vietnam for over 40 years. This one is a big challenge.

My job for the next few days is to work with our team to coordinate delivery of relief (food, household items, soap, mosquito nets etc) to 15,000 families who are struggling in the wake of the storm.