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2023 Hottest Year On Record – EU Climate Monitor

Published

2 years ago

January 10, 2024

The year 2023 was the hottest on record, with the increase in Earth’s surface temperature nearly crossing the critical threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius.

The EU climate monitors said this on Tuesday.

Climate change intensified heatwaves, droughts and wildfires across the planet, and pushed the global thermometer 1.48 C above the preindustrial benchmark, the Copernicus Climate Change Service reported.

“It is also the first year with all days over one degree warmer than the pre-industrial period.

“Temperatures during 2023 likely exceed those of any period in at least the last 100,000 years,” said Samantha Burgess, deputy head of the Copernicus Climate Change Service.

Nearly half the year exceeded the 1.5C limit, beyond which climate impacts are more likely to become self-reinforcing and catastrophic, according to scientists.

But even if Earth’s average surface temperature breaches 1.5C in 2024, as some scientists predict, it does not mean the world has failed to meet the Paris Agreement target of capping global warming under that threshold.

That would occur only after several successive years above the 1.5C benchmark, and even then the 2015 treaty allows for the possibility of reducing Earth’s temperature after a period of “overshoot”.

2023 saw massive fires in Canada, extreme droughts in the Horn of Africa or the Middle East, unprecedented summer heatwaves in Europe, the United States and China, along with record winter warmth in Australia and South America.

“Such events will continue to get worse until we transition away from fossil fuels and reach net-zero emissions,” said University of Reading climate change professor Ed Hawkins, who did not contribute to the report.

“We will continue to suffer the consequences of our inactions today for generations.”

The Copernicus findings come one month after a climate agreement was reached at COP28 in Dubai calling for the gradual transition away from fossil fuels, the main cause of climate warming.

The year saw another ominous record, two days in November 2023 exceeded the preindustrial benchmark by more than two degrees Celsius.

Copernicus predicted that the 12-month period ending in January or February 2024 would “exceed 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial level”.

Reliable weather records date back to 1850, but older proxy data for climate change — from tree rings, ice cores and sediment — show that 2023 temperatures “exceed those of any period in at least the last 100,000 years”, Burgess said.

Records were broken on every continent. In Europe, 2023 was the second-warmest year on record, at 0.17°C cooler than 2020.

2023 saw the beginning of a naturally occurring El Nino weather phenomenon, which warms waters in the southern Pacific and stokes hotter weather beyond.

The phenomenon is expected to reach its peak in 2024 and is linked to the eight consecutive months of record heat from June to December.

Ocean temperatures globally were also “persistently and unusually high”, with many seasonal records broken since April.

These unprecedented ocean temperatures caused marine heatwaves devastating to aquatic life and boosted the intensity of storms.

Oceans absorb more than 90 percent of excess heat caused by human activity, and play a major role in regulating Earth’s climate.

Rising temperatures have also accelerated the melting of ice shelves -– frozen ridges that help prevent massive glaciers in Greenland and West Antarctica from slipping into the ocean and raising sea levels.

Antarctic sea ice hit record-low levels in 2023.

“The extremes we have observed over the last few months provide a dramatic testimony of how far we now are from the climate in which our civilisation developed”, said Carlo Buontempo, C3S director.

In 2023, carbon dioxide and methane concentrations reached record levels of 419 parts per million, and 1,902 parts per billion, respectively.

Methane is the second largest contributor to global warming after CO2, and is responsible for around 30 percent of the rise in global temperatures since the industrial revolution, according to UNEP.

AFP

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Meta Suspends Activists For Showing Election Killings

Published

1 day ago

December 5, 2025

Editor

Meta suspended the Instagram accounts of two Tanzanian activists on Thursday after they posted images of the violent crackdown by security forces on election protests, which authorities have tried to suppress.

Tanzania descended into violence on October 29, the day of elections deemed fraudulent by international observers.

More than 1,000 people were shot dead by security forces over several days of unrest, according to the opposition and rights groups, though the government has yet to give a final toll.

Mange Kimambi, who has more than 2.5 million Instagram followers, had been posting hundreds of photos of the dead and wounded since early November, sent to her by Tanzanians via WhatsApp, she told AFP last month from the United States.

Not all the images have been verified, but AFP fact checkers and other media and investigative sites have found many are real.

On Thursday, Kimambi, in a letter to US President Donald Trump published on X, complained that her Instagram accounts and WhatsApp number had been “deactivated after I raised awareness about a series of severe abuses and horrific events occurring in Tanzania”, including “kidnappings, killings and imprisonment of opposition leaders on fabricated treason charges”.

Another prominent Tanzanian activist, Maria Sarungi Tsehai, who lives in exile, also had her Instagram account suspended, though only within Tanzania.

“Check out @Meta @instagram and their role in enabling the cover up of #TanzaniaMassacre by restricting and deleting our Instagram and Whatsapp accounts,” Tsehai posted on X.

“This is a direct attack on human rights defenders! We work to save lives by whistleblowing about abductions, corruption and killings,” she added.

Contacted by AFP, a spokesperson for Meta justified the action against Kimambi in the name of its “policy against recidivism”, implying she had created new accounts after others were suspended.

The action against Tsehai was a response to “a legal order from Tanzanian regulators”, the spokesperson said.

“If we are unable to provide our services there, millions of people will be deprived of connecting with family and friends,” Meta added.

In early November, Tanzania’s attorney general, Hamza Johari, called for Kimambi to be arrested and threatened to try to have her extradited from the United States, where she lives.

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Why Europe Is Blocking More Nigerian Goods At Its Borders

Published

2 days ago

December 3, 2025

Editor

Nigeria’s exports continue to face repeated rejection in European Union markets, a challenge caused by consistent quality failures, weak regulatory enforcement, and heavy dependence on raw commodities.

New trade figures further show that while export values expressed in naira have risen sharply, dollar earnings have continued to decline, undermining Nigeria’s competitiveness abroad.

Meanwhile, South Africa remains one of the African countries with the highest rate of export acceptance in Nigeria and the EU, highlighting the gaps between both economies’ standards and certification systems.

According to data from International Trade Centre (ITC) , Nigeria’s export earnings fell for a second consecutive year in 2024, dropping by 8.5% to $57.9 billion.

The figure had already declined from $63.3 billion in 2022 to $60.65 billion in 2023. In naira terms, however, total exports rose from ₦26.8 trillion in 2022 to ₦36 trillion in 2023 and surged to ₦77.4 trillion in 2024.

These increases reflect the naira’s steep depreciation, not an improvement in the volume or acceptance of Nigerian goods overseas.

Intelpoint data show that the naira weakened from ₦645.2 to the dollar at the end of 2023 to ₦1,478.9 in 2024, marking the sharpest yearly decline in a decade.

EU border agencies have repeatedly rejected Nigerian agricultural and manufactured goods for failing to meet essential sanitary and phytosanitary requirements.

Frequent violations include excessive pesticide residue, poor traceability, contamination detected during inspection, and inconsistencies in certification documentation issued in Nigeria.

These failures stem largely from fragmented supply chains, weak monitoring capacity and a lack of internationally accredited laboratories.

South Africa, Morocco and Kenya maintain far stronger conformity systems, and South Africa in particular consistently delivers some of the highest acceptance rates across EU ports.

The ITC figures show that oil remains the backbone of Nigeria’s exports, contributing nearly 90 per cent of total earnings between 2022 and 2024. Over that period, the country earned $163.2 billion from crude oil out of total export revenues of $181.8 billion.

Despite this dominance, oil earnings have continued to fall, declining from $57.4 billion in 2022 to $55.6 billion in 2023 and then to $50.3 billion in 2024.

Because crude prices are determined externally and the product is exported with limited value addition, Nigeria gains little competitive advantage from currency depreciation.

Non-oil exports recorded mixed fortunes. Cocoa earnings rose from $679 million in 2022 to $759 million in 2023 and climbed sharply to $2.6 billion in 2024.

Fertiliser exports fell from $1.9 billion in 2022 to $935.4 million in 2024. Ores and residues, however, increased from $158.6 million in 2023 to $824.4 million in 2024.

Despite positive growth in some sectors, quality problems have continued to undermine acceptance in Europe, particularly for foods such as beans, palm oil and processed crops.

Nigeria recorded stronger performance in African markets in 2024 due to the relative strength of the West African CFA franc.

Companies such as Unilever Nigeria, Cadbury Nigeria and Guinness Nigeria reported export sales of ₦22.8 billion in 2024, up from ₦9.92 billion in the preceding year. EU markets, however, maintain stricter inspection standards, and Nigeria’s structural weaknesses continue to limit penetration.

The country’s export structure remains heavily constrained by outdated processing technology, weak inspection capacity, irregular regulatory monitoring, and an overreliance on raw commodities.

Also, pipeline vandalism and crude theft also prevent Nigeria from meeting its production benchmark of 1.7 million barrels per day, despite a rise to 1.5 million barrels per day in 2024.

In December 2023, the Federal Government introduced the Trade Policy of Nigeria (2023–2027), aimed at aligning export regulations with World Trade Organisation rules and boosting global competitiveness.

The policy forms part of a wider reform agenda tied to the Medium-Term National Development Plan (2021–2025) and Agenda 2050.

Despite these initiatives, limited investment in quality assurance, industrial processing and standards enforcement continues to weaken Nigeria’s acceptance in high-value markets such as the EU.

Headline

US Imposes Visa Restrictions On Nigerians Linked To Religious Freedom Violations

Published

2 days ago

December 3, 2025

Editor

The United States government on Wednesday announced visa restrictions targeting individuals involved in violations of religious freedom in Nigeria. The measures may also extend to immediate family members of the affected persons.

In a statement titled “Combating Egregious Anti-Christian Violence in Nigeria and Globally”, the Department of State said the restrictions were being implemented in response to mass killings and attacks on Christians by radical Islamic terrorists, Fulani militias, and other violent actors in Nigeria and elsewhere.

The statement explained that under Section 212(a)(3)(C) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, the State Department would now have the authority to deny visas to those who have “directed, authorised, significantly supported, participated in, or carried out violations of religious freedom,” with the policy potentially extending to their immediate family members.

It further cited former President Donald Trump’s remarks, noting that the United States “cannot stand by while such atrocities are happening in Nigeria, and numerous other countries.” The policy will apply to Nigeria and other governments or individuals implicated in violations of religious freedom.

The announcement follows growing international concern over attacks on religious communities in Nigeria, including targeted killings, abductions, and destruction of property attributed to armed groups.