Malaysia Haze Case Study

1.0 INTRODUCTION

Global warming or climate change are refers to rises scale in average temperature of the Earth. Since 1970, the additional energy have been stored in the climate system and now about more than 90% of them have gone into the ocean because the climate system cannot accommodated the increased energy in the system. This result in the melting of ice and warmed the atmosphere.

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (PICC) in its fifth assessment (AR5) in 2004 reported that the most global warming is cause by increasing concentration of greenhouse gas (GHG) and human activities. According to the report, the temperature is likely to rise further 0.3 to 1.7°C (0.5 to 3.1°F) for the lowest emission scenario and 2.6 to 4.8°C (4.7

Prolonged dry weather, stable atmosphere and high concentration of air pollutant enhance the formation of haze. In Peninsular Malaysia, haze is most likely to occur during the months of January to February and June to August, associated with the drier month. The estimate for haze related damage in selected sectors in Malaysia in terms of the economic losses brought about by the El Nino of 1997/98 was US $ 219 million. The losses in Malaysia included both the economic damage and the abatement cost, such as firefighting, monitoring and enforcement activities. Haze related to air pollution problems, as experienced during the El Nino of 1998/78, represent a substantial health risk to the public. Increased mortality, hospital admission, emergency room visits and respiratory related problems during the haze episodes represent some of the immediate effects of haze on health. The excessive emission of suspended particulate is associated with aggravation of respiratory tract infections, asthma, chronic bronchitis, emphysema and conjunctivitis. The production was also very minimal with a reported drop in the production of chicken at less than 5%. For the pig industry, there were increased cases of respiratory problems, poor growth and abortion, especially during the peak haze period. Aquatic organisms and subsequently the

Research and development is one of the important aspects in agriculture sector. This is because, the production of agriculture has been decrease and it is getting worst as the world is now experiencing the global warming. Research and development on the seeds and eternal of crops that are able to fight or suitable to live in hot and uncertainty weather should be done. This type of seeds or plant that can adapt well to the hot weather able to reduce the possibilities of huge loss among the farmers and at the same time might be able to increase the production outcome. Besides, development on water saving technology also should be focus on. This water saving technology will be very useful on the crop that are not suitable and cannot adapt well to the hot weather. This is because, this type of plant or crop will be needed enough water to stay healthy. Due to hot weather, the water saving easily dried and this will result in the shortage of water supply to the crop. So by improving this water saving technology, the crop production can be maintained even though in hot global