MELBOURNE, Sept. 26 (UPI) -- Climate change has become a major election issue in Australia, gripped by the worst drought in recorded history.
The government, which still has to set a date for the election due before the end of 2007, announced during the past week aid packages to farmers worth nearly $1 billion to help them cope with the dry spell.
But opposition Green Party Sen. Rachel Siewart said Wednesday the government should be looking at the bigger picture.
"We need to acknowledge that we are now dealing with the impact of climate change on agriculture," she told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. "We cannot continue to bury our head in the sand and pretend that it is going to be business as usual."
Australia, like the United States, has not ratified the Kyoto protocol on reducing greenhouse gas emissions which scientists say are a major cause of global warming.
The opposition Labor Party, meanwhile, said it will announce clean energy targets of 20 percent or more, even though its economic analysis of such a move will not be ready before mid-2008.
Prime Minister John Howard this week announced plans for a national clean energy target of 15 percent.
