Islamic State tops climate change as concern for rich, for the poor it's reversed

T

he barbaric acts and military gains of Islamic State have succeeded in sowing fear in Australia and other wealthy nations, with a new poll showing the extremist group is considered the biggest global threat in all but one advanced economy surveyed.

But poorer nations overwhelmingly rated climate change as the top menace to global security, according to a report from the Pew Global Research Centre.

Pew, a US-based research organisation, interviewed more than 45,000 people in 40 countries for the survey.

The poll, released overnight, found that Australia and nine other countries with advanced economies all ranked Islamic State (IS) as the biggest threat.

Read the Age story - “Rich nations worry about Islamic State; poor fear climate change: Pew survey”.

Climate change threatens security and economic wellbeing

Climate change poses as grave a threat to the UK's security and economic resilience as terrorism and cyber-attacks, according to a senior military commander who was appointed as William Hague's climate envoy this year.

Rear Admiral
 Neil Morisetti.

 

In his first interview since taking up the post, Rear Admiral Neil Morisetti said climate change was "one of the greatest risks we face in the 21st century", particularly because it presented a global threat. "By virtue of our interdependencies around the world, it will affect all of us," he said.

He argued that climate change was a potent threat multiplier at choke points in the global trade network, such as the Straits of Hormuz, through which much of the world's traded oil and gas is shipped.

The Guardian story, headed: “Climate change poses grave threat to security, says UK envoy”, said, “Morisetti's central message was simple and stark: "The areas of greatest global stress and greatest impacts of climate change are broadly coincidental."