Canadians deem climate change top threat

OTTAWA, Jan. 11 (UPI) -- Canadians think climate change is a bigger threat to their well-being than terrorism, a poll released Monday indicates.

A survey commissioned by the Canadian Defense and Foreign Affairs Institute and conducted by the Innovative Research Group Inc., found that nearly half of the respondents called climate change a "critical threat," while only 28 percent deemed terrorism to be such a threat, Canwest News Service reported.

The findings showed a marked decrease on the critical assessment of terrorism compared with a similar poll conducted a year ago. In the earlier survey, climate change and terrorism were rated about equally as a threat at 52 percent and 49 percent respectively.

Senior research fellow Lt. Gen. Michael Jeffery told Canwest the shift has happened because terrorism is not on the front burner for many Canadians, adding that that is a "dangerous perception. We are not aware that the world around us has changed and is continuing to change, and emerging from that very, very different world are increasing threats to Canada, Canadians and our way of life."

Canwest said the online survey was conducted among members of Innovative's Canada 20/20 panel, included 1,229 responses, with a margin of error of 2.8 percentage points.