Kilimanjaro in world spotlight over climate change

With the spotlight on Copenhagen, many of the world’s high places are experiencing environmental destruction in myriad ways, some subtle, others devastating.

Katrina Manson investigates on the slopes of Kilimanjaro for Reuters in an article published recently entitled : Wish we weren't here: postcards to Copenhagen - It reads

KILIMANJARO, Tanzania - Zakaria Kessy, a mountain guide standing at Kilimanjaro's base camp as a group of German tourists arrived to down to a congratulatory bottle of champagne, has seen big changes in his 18 years on the job.

"The snow used to start at 3,600 meters when I started, but now it's only at the very top," he said. The mountain, Africa's highest, rises 5,896 meters high.

Images of the snow cap adorn rusting zinc shacks and beer-bottle labels at the base, but according to one recent U.S. scientific study, the cap may disappear by 2033.

The disappearance of forests in the past 30 to 40 years on the lower slopes -- cut down by villagers for charcoal and open farmland -- is just as much to blame as rising temperatures worldwide, said Jo Anderson, director of Ecological Initiatives, an environmental consultancy based in northern Tanzania.

Forests trap moisture and bring rain.

Batilda Burian, Tanzania's environment minister, told Reuters the east African country was losing 91,500 hectares (226,100 acres) of forest a year, of its 33 million hectare total.

"Because of a four-year drought, 345,000 of our 1 million livestock here in Tanzania have been killed, most of them in one area, challenging the livelihoods of the people," she said.

Reorting by Katrina Manson in Kilimanjaro, Tanzania; compiled by Sara Ledwith