[ti:UN Report: Last 10 Years Likely the Hottest Decade on Record] [by:www.51voa.com] [00:00.00]更多听力请访问51VOA.COM [00:00.04]The United Nations weather agency says the past 10 years [00:06.20]were likely the hottest decade since scientists began keeping records. [00:13.92]In a new report, the World Meteorological Organization, or WMO, [00:20.40]blames the rising temperatures mainly on greenhouse gases produced by human activities. [00:30.76]"Average temperatures for the five-year, 2015-to-2019 and 10-year, 2010-to-2019 periods [00:41.52]are almost certain to be the highest on record," the WMO said. [00:49.44]The report predicted that 2019 would become the second- or third-warmest year on record. [00:59.08]Final temperature measurements will not be available for several months. [01:05.80]Petteri Taalas is the Secretary-General of the WMO. [01:11.08]He says severe heatwaves and floods that used to happen [01:16.40]about once every hundred years have become "regular" events. [01:23.40]"Countries ranging from the Bahamas to Japan to Mozambique [01:28.56]suffered the effect of devastating tropical cyclones. [01:34.20]Wildfires swept through the Arctic and Australia," he noted. [01:41.00]Taalas said that one of the main effects of climate change is the lack of predictable rainfall. [01:49.40]This presents a threat to successful harvests and will likely create [01:55.05]food security problems in some countries in the future, he said. [02:02.24]The report said climate change was a main driver of a recent increase [02:07.95]in world hunger after 10 years of decrease. [02:13.16]It estimated that about 820 million people suffered from hunger in 2018. [02:22.40]The WMO said that weather disasters have displaced millions of people this year [02:29.40]and affected rainfall from India to northern Russia, to the central United States and other areas. [02:39.48]Oceans, which take in an estimated 90 percent of the extra heat [02:44.89]produced by greenhouse gases, are now at their highest recorded temperatures. [02:52.36]Sea water is also 25 percent more acidic than it was 150 years ago, the report said. [03:02.36]This is threatening ocean environments that provide food and jobs for billions of people. [03:10.88]Levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere reached a record [03:15.85]407.8 parts per million in 2018 and continued to rise in 2019. [03:25.92]Experts say carbon dioxide can be damaging because it can remain in the atmosphere [03:32.96]for hundreds of years and in the ocean for even longer. [03:39.48]On Monday, at the opening of a climate meeting in Spain, [03:44.17]United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres [03:48.66]warned that 400 parts per million had once been considered "unthinkable." [03:55.80]The UN Climate Change Conference brings together representatives from around the world [04:01.76]to seek solutions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. [04:08.40]Last year, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [04:13.81]set a goal for countries to limit temperature increases to 1.5 Celsius or below. [04:23.60]The group said this target could be reached by reducing greenhouse gases [04:29.44]and restructuring the world economy to expand renewable energy sources. [04:37.08]The UN reported last week that the world needed to cut carbon emissions [04:43.01]by 7.6 percent each year, every year, until 2030, to reach the 1.5 Celsius temperature goal. [04:55.36]The WMO's Petteri Taalas urged the world to quickly launch steps [05:01.77]aimed at reducing temperatures before it is too late. [05:07.16]"If we do not take urgent climate action now, then we are heading [05:12.36]for a temperature increase of more than 3°Celsius by the end of the century, [05:18.76]with ever more harmful impacts on human wellbeing," he said. [05:25.80]I'm Bryan Lynn. [05:27.65]更多听力请访问51VOA.COM