If we had any doubts that we are already in the middle of climate change, a damning report published by the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) should cast those misgivings aside. And, as expected, the report has said in unequivocal terms that we, humans, are to blame for warming the atmosphere, oceans and land.

The report, by far the most comprehensive study on climate change, has, among other things, said that the global surface temperature rose by 1.09 degrees Celsius in the decade between 2011 and 2020 from the decades between 1850 and 1900; the past five years have been the hottest on record since 1850; human activities have caused the global retreat of glaciers; and heat waves have become more frequent and more intense since the 1950s.

These, though, are just the beginnings of the apocalypse that we are set to bring upon ourselves if we do not mend our ways. We have already lost our precious time to prevent climate change, and we might see a 2-metre rise of the sea level by the end of this century, or a 5-metre rise by 2150—a doom for humanity indeed. As per the report, extreme climate events such as heat waves, heavy precipitation, droughts and cyclones are going to be the norm rather than the exception in the days to come.

South Asia is going to be no exception, the report says, with the frequency and intensity of precipitation, flooding and landslides increasing to unprecedented levels. And for Nepal, with its fragile glaciers, the warming is nothing short of a death knell. UN Secretary-General Antonio Gueterres is right in saying that this indeed is "code red for humanity".

Does that mean the end of the world? Not really—if the authors of the report are to be believed. The scientists say, if we can cut global emissions in half by 2030 and reach net zero by the middle of the century, we can halt or even reverse the rise in temperatures. But the big question is: Will the world come together to undo the damage done as of today, and seek a way out of the crisis for the future of the planet?

Although many countries have pledged to reduce their carbon footprint significantly, they have done precious little as of now, and we are running pretty late. As the writer Naomi Klein has rightly pointed out, for all their commitments to limiting the rise of the temperature and helping the planet breathe, global governments will sit idle as industries and conglomerates continue to exploit the crisis and bring about "far less desirable forms of social, political and economic transformation". In This Changes Everything, Klein warns that "rather than sparking solutions that have a real chance of preventing catastrophic warming and protecting us from inevitable disasters, the crisis will once again be seized upon to hand over yet more resources to the 1 percent".

How long will we continue to let a select few exploit Planet Earth at the cost of our very existence? There is no doubt that the big industrial countries are the vanguards of exploitation, but those of us in the less developed countries can no longer get away with blaming others. The KP Sharma Oli government, in its final budget, proposed extracting and exporting sand and gravel from the fragile Chure mountain range just to earn a few million rupees a year before the plan was stalled by the Supreme Court. As one of the most vulnerable countries to the effects of climate change, we must continue to keep vigil and do our bit in the global fight against rising temperatures.