A new survey of the international conservationist organisation World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) showed that the global warming was intensifying faster than expected, WWF Bulgaria said in a media statement. The organisation invited everyone interested in the topic to a discussion on climate change on October 27 in its Sofia office.

During the meeting, environmentalists will answer questions on climate change and what it would mean for Bulgaria, as well as what the European Commission and the Government were doing on the issue. Short films on the global warming will be screened.

In 2007, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), numbering more than 4000 experts from 150 countries, published its fourth assessment report on climate change, but the new WWF survey, called Climate change: faster, stronger, sooner, claims to show that global warming is intensifying beyond IPCC forecasts.

The latest surveys show that the Arctic Ocean would lose its ice coverage 30 years earlier than the IPCC expected: the ice will be completely lost between 2013 and 2040. The number and strength of the extreme cyclones over Great Britain and the North Sea will intensify, which would impact the wind's speed and the storms over Western and Central Europe. The annual rainfall quantity is expected to increase in most parts of Europe, which leads to risk of floods and economic damages, WWF Bulgaria warned.

The droughts will intensify at the Mediterranean coast. The melting of ice in the Alps will lead to less electricity produced in the hydropower plants. The climate changes already have impacted the wheat, maize and oats corps.

In Bulgaria, the strong fires during the last five to 10 years are due to the droughts. The drying of rivers is due to the reduced rainfall quantities mainly during the winter and the lack of enough snow to keep the water balance throughout the year, WWF Bulgaria said. The catastrophic floods, which took tens of victims, are also due to the felling of forests and the huge amounts of rainfall, which always falls down for a short period of time during the season, which normally had least rainfalls.

"If the European Union wants to be recognised as a leader at the UN 2009 meeting in Copenhagen and to help achieve global contract for real combat against the climate changes after 2012, it has to stop avoiding responsibility and to make real reduction of its greenhouse gas emissions," WWF Bulgaria's media statement said.

The world biggest environmental organizations WWF, Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, and Climate Action Network Europe called on the EU leaders and its members to start actions to decrease the EU greenhouse gas emissions by 30 per cent. They also called on the EU to provide substantial support including financial support to the developing countries to fight the climate changes, to adapt to them and reduce the negative impact, which could be avoided, WWF said.