ANOTHER VIEW Global warning

Only an economics correspondent could insist (yesterday, "Global warming won't cost the earth"), that the most rational response to the threat of climate change and sea-level rises is to do nothing now, but to get rich quick and adapt when it happens.

Forget about agreeing new greenhouse gas reduction targets at the Climate Change Convention in Berlin this week, the argument goes. Wait until warming impacts are certain, then we'll know what needs to be done and where. That gives us 20-odd years to make more money to build sea walls and other adaptive defences against environmental change. Meanwhile, there are other more pressing problems to tackle: tropical forest loss and species extinctions, soil erosion, air pollution and health impacts.

Despite the superficial attraction of this laissez-faire market approach - much favoured, incidentally, in the United States, an already very rich country that is almost certain to exceed significantly its very modest goal of stabilising emissions at 1990 levels by 2000 - it is a deeply selfish and dangerous response. By the time we know global warming is certain, it is likely to be too late to implement many adaptive responses.

The wait-and-see response won't help many developing countries either. Their wealth-creating capacity, and the needs of their people, mostly depend on living natural resources such as soils, forests and the oceans. Despite increasing industrialisation, that is is still likely to be so in 20 years' time. No one knows how to adapt farm, forestry or fisheries management to maintain productivity from these resources if weather systems and rainfall patterns change dramatically, or if ocean currents shift and fish stocks disappear.

There is no harm in trying to develop adaptation further. But only as a complement to an effective emission reductions strategy, with targets and timetable for action implemented globally.

The strategic approach has many advantages. Targets can be reviewed and changed as better information becomes available. It encourages co-operative relations between nations acting together to solve a common problem. Reducing greenhouse gas emissions will help to solve other environmental problems and bring economic and social benefits today.

Cutting back on energy use saves money for householders and firms alike, reduces global warming and acid rain pollutants, and encourages industrial competitiveness. Burning tropical forests causes 25 per cent of all carbon dioxide emissions: stopping this extravagant waste not only combats climate change, but is the single most effective way of saving threatened wild species. Such "win-win" gains benefit the present generation and are most likely to improve life for future generations: the essence of sustainable development. We can have them if we act now. Surely that is the most rational response to global warming?

The writer is director of Friends of the Earth.