Climate Migration in the Modern World
In recent years there has been a massive increase of migrants entering into Europe from the Middle East. It is very easy to immediately jump to the conclusion that this increase is due to the wars that plague the region. However, believing wars are the only reason for recent mass migration ignores a crucial factor which contributed to the beginning of these conflicts. Lack of resources and severe drought, as a result of climate change, greatly increased the chance of armed conflict.
Climate change has made the occurrence of floods, droughts, storms, and all kinds of other natural disasters more common. As these events continue to increase in number, mass migration on an unprecedented scale will occur, as well as even more competition for food, water and resources.
In 2017, anywhere between 22.5 million and 24 million people were forced to migrate due to floods, storms, fires and droughts. It is estimated by the World Bank that 143 million climate migrants will come from Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Southeast Asia alone by 2050. As more countries succumb to climate disaster, the humanitarian crisis that follow will be unimaginable and lead to a mass exodus of places impacted by climate change as the people there attempt to escape war and poverty.
There are only a few instances in history where climate change has been the only factor that leads to people leaving their home country. Most of the time it is simply a contributing factor. However, in the Pacific Islands this is not the case. There, sea levels rise by 12 millimeters every year and 8 islands have already been completely submerged and two more are in serious danger. The inhabitants of these islands are fleeing at massive rates, and by 2100, around 48 islands will have completely disappeared. Due to these islands small populations the crisis is not receiving a great amount of media attention; however, they are an example of what is to come if this crisis is not adequately addressed.
Growth of urban areas will likely lead to even more climate refugees. This is because as the economies in the countries threatened by climate change grow, their demands for more energy and urban areas will as well. Increased development of natural areas leads to fewer areas where water can sink back into the ground, making flooding more likely. The World Bank predict that these and more factors will lead to the South Asian economy alone losing 1.8 percent of its annual GDP by 2050. This will contribute to a lower standard of living for the people in those countries and potentially an influx of refugees, as well as impact the economy of the entire world.
The Syrian Civil War was directly preceded by an extreme drought which forced many people into poverty and increased the success of recruitment strategies by terror groups, as they promised financial security. In this way climate change directly contributed to both the horror of the Syrian Civil War and the migration crisis which directly followed it.
The United Nations has a complex system in place which both protects and helps those forced to flee from their home countries due to political or social violence. However, these protections do not at this time extend to climate refugees. As climate change destroys more countries both financially and in terms of physical land, there will be an increase in refugees that the world is simply unprepared for. There is no legal reason that climate refugees should be protected under international law. In 2015, a family from the quickly disappearing island nation of Kiribati applied for asylum in New Zealand, only to have their case dismissed by the High Court of New Zealand. If the world does not address this coming threat, millions will be in danger and the international community will be completely overwhelmed by a migration crisis worse than that which followed World War Two.
Guy Abel, Michael Brottrager, Jesus Crespo Cuaresma, and Raya Muttarak, “Climate, Conflict and Forced Migration,” International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Global Environmental Change, no. 54, (January 2019): 239-249, http://pure.iiasa.ac.at/id/eprint/15684/
John Podesta, “The Climate Crisis, Migration and Refugees,” Brookings Institute, July 25, 2019, https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-climate-crisis-migration-and-refugees/.
Podesta, “Climate Crisis” Brookings Institute, https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-climate-crisis-migration-and-refugees/.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.