Synonyms of the "Recent" to avoid appearing twice in a sentence

I am constructing a sentence which uses the word "Recent" twice.

The sentence is "the land use changes in recent years are greatly affecting the recent climate."

I would like to avoid one "recent" in the above sentence.

Solution 1:

It's not quite a synonym as the meaning of the word is not quite the same, but you could use the word "current", to refer to what's happening to the recent climate is quite likely still happening. Or if you want a more recent-like sounding replacement, go into the specifics about what the part of "recent years" entail. If you can find that answer you can change it to "the last two years", "the last decade" or "the last couple of years";if you want to keep it vague.

Solution 2:

I would like to avoid one "recent" in

"the land use changes in recent years are greatly affecting the recent climate."

An effect always follows after a cause—so my advice would be to change the verb tense.

You are defining a cause ("land use changes") as being "recent," so change the verb tense and force the effect to be found in a time even more recent than when the cause took place. Since the cause is "recent" and the effect is closer to the present than the cause, it will be understood that the "climate" has been "affected" at a time even more recent than the recent "land use changes."

Thus, the land use changes in recent years have greatly affected the climate.