• World Trade
 

Another area of contention is the economy - global warming pesimists predict that the world's financial affairs will slip into chaos as more and more low lying land sinks under the waves owing to rising sea levels, crops will fail leading to civil unrest and there will be huge population movements away from the equatorial regions into the cooler parts of the world which will not only precipitate huge disruption to the mineral resources and timber but will also cause unendurable strains on the infrastructures of the countries that these displaced masses settle into. Mass migrations throughout history have almost inevitably resulted in warfare as the needy immigrants compete with the indiginous populations for land, jobs, food, even marital partners and if this happened on a world-wide scale the result could be a total breakdown of law and order with genocide and mass starvation wreaking havoc on the entire human race.

The world's trading systems will, therefore grind to a halt as populations fall and labour becomes unavailable, raw material production is hit so factories have to close. All the industries down the line will suffer; sales, transport and distribution, financing - a catastrophe for world trade which will take several generations to rebuild, if ever. Global warming, the pessimists say, will be the ultimate disaster for world trade, and the prosperity will disappear in the business slump that will follow.

"Stuff and nonsense!" say the optimists. A scenario like this completely ignores the most important factors of all - the ingenuity, resourcefulness and adaptability of humankind.