UN Envoy Says World Must Stop Next El Niño Harming Development
Governments have been too slow to respond to droughts and floods linked to the El Niño weather pattern, and must do better next time if global development goals are to be met, said Mary Robinson, U.N. special envoy for El Niño and climate.
Last year, U.N. member states agreed on an ambitious set of 17 goals to end poverty, hunger and inequality by 2030, known as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
In an interview with the Thomson Reuters Foundation, Robinson said the world's mishandling of El Niño - a warming of Pacific Ocean surface waters - has hurt the most vulnerable communities and threatened progress to meet the SDGs.
Tim de Waal