Scientists' grim predictions of an even worse rate of global warming means the world must act immediately to help poor people cope with the now inevitable ravages of climate change.

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report published today indicates in the starkest terms how the world is plummeting towards climate catastrophe. A twin strategy must be adopted urgently to help protect the most vulnerable people in developing countries who are on the front line of climate change and whom the report says are now under imminent threat from drought, flood, sea-level rise or conflict over scarce resources.

"The IPCC's report shows there is not a second to lose," said Andrew Pendleton, Christian Aid's senior climate change analyst. "Deadly greenhouse gas emissions must be stopped in their tracks and reversed. At the same time, the industrialised world - where the majority of emissions have been emitted - must compensate poor countries to help them adapt and survive."

Mr Pendleton said that $40 billion per year, the upper end of the World Bank's estimate of the cost of adaptation in poor countries, should be taken as a starting point. He urged UK Prime Minister Tony Blair to take the lead in finding an adequate compensatory mechanism.

"This is not aid money, this is justice," Mr Pendleton said. "The rich world owes poor countries more money than we can count for causing this problem in the first place. It is truly outrageous that the industrialised world continues to pump greenhouse gases out into the atmosphere and then talks about only a few million pounds in handouts.

"The IPCC has now confirmed that the climate change caused by these emissions is already threatening the lives and livelihoods of poor people so we can no longer afford to tinker at the edges of this problem. In addition to cutting our own emissions, we need a survival strategy of Marshall Plan proportions for poor countries threatened by climate change," Mr Pendleton said.

ENDS

For more information or to arrange an interview please call Katy Migiro on 020 7523 2058

Notes to editors

The World Bank estimates the cost of 'climate-proofing' investments in developing countries as being between $10 and 40 billion a year.

There are three funds currently in operation to help poor countries adapt to climate change. Two of these, the Least Developed Countries Fund and the Special Climate Change Fund, are reliant on voluntary contributions from rich countries. At the UN's climate change summit in Marrakech 2001, rich countries pledged $450 million a year for adaptation, a tiny fraction of what is needed. By the end of 2006, only $67 million in total had been formally pledged - a fraction of a fraction.

The third fund, the Adaptation Fund, is financed through a 2 per cent tax on Clean Development Mechanism projects, but has yet to be put into operation. The Adaptation Fund will be managed by developing countries themselves. Christian Aid believes that this type of mechanism, which will bring compensation for adaptation through the trading or taxing of carbon dioxide emissions, is preferable to relying on the notoriously volatile flows of aid.

Christian Aid is calling for rich countries to cut their carbon dioxide emissions by at least 5 per cent per year and by 90 per cent by 2050.