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“ PEOPLE WHO ARE SOCIALLY, ECONOMICALLY, CULTURALLY, POLITICALLY, INSTITUTIONALLY, OR OTHERWISE MARGINALIZED ARE ESPECIALLY VULNERABLE TO CLIMATE CHANGE”supply, damage to infrastructure and settlements, morbidity and mortality, and consequences for mental health and human well-being.The key risks of climate change that follow span various sectors and regions:■ Risk of death, injury, ill-health, or disrupted livelihoods in low-lying coastal zones and small island developing states and other small islands, due to storm surges, coastal flooding, and sea level rise. ■ Risk of severe ill-health and disrupted livelihoods for large urban populations due to inland flooding in some regions. ■ Systemic risks due to extreme weather events leading to breakdown of infrastructure networks and critical services such as electricity, water supply, and health and emergency services. ■ Risk of mortality and morbidity during periods of extreme heat, particularly for vulnerable urban populations and those working outdoors in urban or rural areas. ■ Risk of food insecurity and the breakdown of food systems linked to warming, drought, flooding, and precipitation variability and extremes, particularly for poorer populations in urban and rural settings. ■ Risk of loss of rural livelihoods and income due to insufficient access to drinking and irrigation water and reduced agricultural productivity, particularly for farmers and pastoralists with minimal capital in semi-arid regions. ■ Risk of loss of marine and coastal ecosystems, biodiversity, and the ecosystem goods, functions, and services they provide for coastal livelihoods, especially for fishing communities in the tropics and the Arctic.■ Risk of loss of terrestrial and inland water ecosystems, biodiversity, and the ecosystem goods, functions, and services they provide for livelihoods.Throughout the 21st century, climate-change impacts are projected to slow down economic growth, make poverty reduction more difficult, further erode food security, and prolong existing and create new poverty traps, the latter particularly in urban areas and emerging hotspots of hunger.The overall risks of climate change impacts can be reduced by limiting the rate and magnitude of climate change. With the adoption of the Paris Agreement at the 21st Session of the Conference of the Parties (COP-21) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in December 2015, the global community took a significant step towards tackling climate change, and a much more ambitious one than many had expected before the Conference.The Paris Agreement is science-centred and focuses on the issues raised by the IPCC in its Fifth Assessment Report (AR5), which was released in four parts between September 2013 and November 2014. It is fair to say that without the contribution of the IPCC, it would not have been possible to reach an agreement of this scope and scientific basis. AR5, which provides a clear and up to date view of the current state of scientific knowledge relevant to climate change, is based on the excellent work of the 830 IPCC authors from over 80 countries, who devoted so generously their time and expertise to write AR5; the thousands of experts from the scientific community, civil society and government, who commented on the drafts of the report; and the government representatives who worked intensively with the authors on the final text of the Summaries for Policymakers of the reports of the three Working Groups and the Synthesis Report. Providing a summary for policymakers in a language they understand and in context provides an introduction to the complex scientific content.The key findings of the IPCC Assessment Reports are the following:■ Human activity is disrupting our climate;■ The more we disrupt our climate, the more we risk severe, pervasive and irreversible impacts;■ We can make the choice to limit climate change and build a more vibrant world.The UK Parliament’s House of Commons Select Committee on Energy and Climate change has examined the process and findings of the IPCC. The outcome of this review, published on 29 July 2014, concluded that the IPCC has responded extremely well to constructive criticism in the last few years and has tightened its review processes to make its AR5 the most exhaustive and heavily scrutinized Assessment Report to date and compiled to the highest standards of scholarship. The committee found the science to be robust and called on the IPCC to continue to improve its transparency. The IPCC would benefit, they say, from recruiting a small team of non climate scientists to observe the review process and the plenary meetings where the Summary for Policymakers is agreed.Once the AR5 was published, IPCC authors and elected officials made countless presentations to policymakers around the world to ensure that the IPCC findings were foremost in their attention. Critically, they engaged with the UNFCCC GLOBAL VOICES 041