Climate change could reduce global economic growth by 3.0%

Climate change could shave three percentage points off global economic growth over the next three decades, revealed a study from the Economist Intelligence Unit that was published late on Tuesday.

Africa, South America and the Middle East were likely to be impacted the most by climate change, as they had higher temperatures on average and smaller economies, leaving them more vulnerable to changes.

The former was the most vulnerable to the economic fallout, the EIU said, with that continent's economy standing to grow by 4.7% less over the next 30 years than would otherwise have been the case.

"Countries, both developed and developing, will need to make a greater effort on the domestic front to meet their goals on adaptation and mitigation for the economic impacts to be reduced," said EIU Country Analysis Director John Ferguson.

The North American economy on the other hand was expected to prove most resilient to climate change, although it would not escape its impact either.

US economic growth was expected to be impacted by more than 1% over the following three decades and growth per capita to be 10.5% lower over the next 81 years.

“The EIU’s climate change model calculates that by 2050, the US economy will be 1.1% smaller than it would have been in the absence of climate change,” the EIU report said.

“Recent events in the U.S. have demonstrated the serious vulnerabilities that exist even in major developed economies,” the EIU added.

Western Europe's GDP growth stands to be 1.7% lower over the next 30 years, putting it in second place behind North America.

World leaders are set to meet in early December in Madrid, Spain, at the UN climate change conference to discuss how to limit the global average temperature rise.