Speaking about the new Africagate story - the best telling is at EU Referendum - Bob Watson has been telling Jonathan Leake about his views on how claims in the IPCC reports need to be substantiated.
Watson said such claims should be based on hard evidence. “Any such projection should be based on peer-reviewed literature from computer modelling of how agricultural yields would respond to climate change. I can see no such data supporting the IPCC report,” he said."
Peer Review Josh '10Well, of course. Anyone who believes in the integrity of science would expect the conclusions to be made on the basis of such hard evidence.
Presumably then, when Bob Watson was in charge of the IPCC, everything was based on hard science?
Well, not quite. While my impression is that there was less input from advocacy groups on Watson's watch, searching the Third Assessment Report for the word "Greenpeace" returns 52 results, including for example, references like this:
Hoegh-Guldberg, O., 1999: Climate Change, Coral Bleaching and the Future of the World's Coral Reefs. Greenpeace International, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 27 pp.
Gibson, M.A. and S.A. Schullinger, 1998: Answers from the Ice Edge: The Consequences of Climate Change on Life in the Bering and Chukchi Seas. Greenpeace Arctic Network, Anchorage, AK, USA, pp. 32.
Perhaps Professor Watson is a new convert to the cause of scientific integrity in the IPCC reports.