According to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, since 2008 over 318 million people globally have been forcibly displaced from their homes by floods, windstorms, earthquakes or droughts, 30.7 million in 2020 alone. This is the equivalent of one person every second (Apap & du Revel, 2021). Climate change is possibly the single most pressing issue of our time and disaster displacement is one of its greatest consequences. Entire populations are already suffering the impacts but these impacts will be felt hardest by already vulnerable communities who have fewer alternatives for adaptation. The climate induced migration nexus is widely acknowledge but as of now, the international response is limited and protection for those affected remains inadequate. The United Nations (UN) 2030 Sustainable Development Goals include several targets on migration including SDG 10.7 – “Facilitate orderly, safe, regular and responsible migration and mobility of people, including through the implementation of planned and well-managed migration policies.” However, so far the progress towards achieving this goal has been limited.
One of the most critical challenges for these people who are often described as “climate refugees” – is that there is no clear definition for this term or category of people. The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) does not currently endorse the term nor are they covered by the 1951 Refugee Convention, leaving them even more vulnerable. Refugee status is reserved for those in fear of persecution for their race, nationality, religion, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion, and are unable to seek protection in their home countries. However, climate refugees are still rendered stateless by circumstances beyond their control. This lack of definition leaves people in limbo and prevents them from accessing asylum, providing them with security and stability in a safer place.
While many of those forced to migrate do so within their own countries borders, some move abroad and are referred to as “externally displaced persons”. However, most of the research in this field is focussed on internally displaced persons, meaning it is harder to get a clear overview of the scale of cross-border migration resulting from environmental disasters. The lack of data on the matter is also due to the legal void regarding the status of external climate migrants and prevents the implementation of an international legal framework to address the issue.
The link between climate change and forced displacement has been acknowledged among many international organisations. The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has stated that climate related impacts are worsening living conditions for already vulnerable communities and acting as a trigger for migration. The UN has made efforts to establish a universal definition for what constitutes a “climate refugee”. However, this does not mean that climate migrants are granted refugee status and countries must come together to make this new definition legally binding to ensure the support and protection of these people.
COP26 missed the opportunity to draw attention to the issue of climate refugees. The Prime Minister of Barbados, Mia Mottley and the Foreign Minister of Tuvalu, Simon Kofe set the tone for the opening ceremony by highlighting the threat that is rising sea levels for many island nations. However, the link between the “pressing issues of human mobility under climate change” discussed in these speeches and the global refugee crisis was not made throughout the entirety of the conference. Expanding access to asylum for climate refugees is crucial for upholding commitment to human rights as well having the benefit of bolstering economic growth.
Sources & further reading:
IPCC Sixth Assessment Report 2022 https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg2/
The UN Sustainable Development Goals https://sdgs.un.org/goals
Zurich.com. (2022). Retrieved 28 August 2022, from https://www.zurich.com/en/media/magazine/2022/there-could-be-1-2-billion-climate-refugees-by-2050-here-s-what-you-need-to-know#:~:text=The%20term%20%E2%80%9Cclimate%20refugees%E2%80%9D%20has,disruption.%E2%80%9D%20But%20the%20extent%20of.
