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TechnoratiWater Stress, Ocean Levels to Unleash 'Climate Exodus'
BONN, Germany - Tens of millions of people will be displaced by climate change in coming years, posing social, political and security problems of an unprecedented dimension, a new study said on Wednesday.
![[Corals grow at the protected Bunaken Island marine national park in Manado. Tens of millions of people will be displaced by climate change in coming years, posing social, political and security problems of an unprecedented dimension, a new study said. (AFP/File/Romeo Gacad)]](http://www.commondreams.org/files/article_images/climatechange_exodus.jpg "climatechange_exodus.jpg")
"Unless aggressive measures are taken to halt global warming, the consequences for human migration and displacement could reach a scope and scale that vastly exceed anything that has occurred before," its authors warned.
"Climate change is already contributing to migration and displacement.
"All major estimates project that the trend will rise to tens of millions of migrants in coming years. Within the next few decades, the consequences of climate change for human security efforts could be devastating."
The report, "In Search of Shelter," was compiled by specialists from Columbia University in New York and the United Nations University, and from a non-governmental organisation, CARE International.
It was presented to journalists on the sidelines of the UN climate talks in Bonn, a staging post to an envisioned new global pact for tackling global warming and its impacts.
The study swung the spotlight on several regions that, according to projections, will be badly hit by rising sea levels, flood or drought.
Rather than a migration from poor countries to rich ones, the exodus is most likely to unfold within poor nations, with a movement mainly from the countryside to cities, thus further burdening urban infrastructure, it said.
In central Mexico, where tens of millions of people live, rainfall in some areas could decline by up to 50 percent by 2080, "rendering many livelihoods unviable and dramatically raising the risk of chronic hunger," the report said.
South Asia faces both short- and long-term threats.
Warming will accelerate melting from Himalayan glaciers in springtime, thus heightening the probability of flooding. But glacier shrinkage will eventually affect the flow of major rivers that wind down from the Himalayan foothills.
"This has a lot of consequences for agricultural production in one of the world's most populous regions," said Charles Ehrhart, climate-change coordinator at CARE.
The Ganges Delta, small island states and other low-lying areas, meanwhile, are in peril from rising sea levels.
If ocean levels rise by two metres (seven feet), "9.4 million people would be completely flooded out" in Bangladesh alone, said Ehrhart.
A two-metre (seven-feet) rise is seen by most climate scientists as being at the top end of predictions for what could happen this century.
In 2007, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) predicted sea levels will rise by up to 59 centimeters (23 inches) before 2100 due the expansion of warmer waters.
But this figure does not factor in a partial melting of massive ice sheets in western Antarctica and Greenland, a scenario now identified by more recent research.
The new report urged policymakers to develop tools to identify regions and populations at risk of being displaced by climate change.
And they said funds mustered to help cope with climate change under the future global treaty must also be directed at poor migrants.
The new pact, designed to run from 2012, would chiefly slash emissions from fossil fuels and deforestation that are warming Earth's atmosphere, affecting weather patterns.
The report admits that the definition of a climate migrant is complex, as poverty, a run of bad harvests or civil strife are usually the immediate, and thus most visible, triggers for displacement.
Estimates of the likely numbers range from 25 to 50 million people by 2010, while the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has pitched a figure of 200 million by 2050.
The term "climate refugee" is shunned by UN organisations, as "refugee" is a term with legal connotations under the 1851 Geneva Convention.
17 Comments so far
Show AllTime to get a boat...
Anybody else seen the movie "After the Warming" with James Burke?
This not entirely a bad thing as these people will get an opportunity to resettle in the Arctic and Antarctic regions which will have melted off completely by then.
I'm sorry, but nobody is going to resettle in the Arctic unless it's on a boat--there is no land there.
If the Antarctic region melts completely, I don't think there will be much land above sea-level anymore, including Antarctica.
redruby, exactly.
but you're preaching something that the congregation doesn't want to hear.
Regardless of climate change opinions, it amazes me that no one will hardly bring up the idea of TOO MANY PEOPLE; a viral plague upon the earth. Too few resources for many sickly bodies. Then those who tell us not to use good birth control. Yes, prepare your kids - tell them not to procreate! Oh wait, but that would mean no darling grandchildren.
gee, greendragon, since there's no such thing as global warming, why worry about rainforest destruction or any of the other "real issues at the intersection of social justice and environment...?"
the entire region i live in experiences record high temps on any given day of any given month, along with record high overnight lows during this same time period (i.e. any given night of any given month), for many years now. combine these factors with a current and ongoing drought in the exceptional category, of more than five years, and i'll be sure to keep my winter clothes close to my permanently fired up wood stove.
there's a reason why the birds and animals in the natural world are changing their living and migration and hibernation habits. they are aware of the situation and aren't walking (or flying) around in denial, with their heads up their asses.
Lino, where are you located where this record heat is happening? Most of the world is experiencing cooler than average temps and has for most of the year.
"Unless aggressive measures are taken to halt global warming..."
Enough with this fantasy, already - the entire world is not, no way, never ever going to suddenly band together to halt global anything. Period.
How is that not clear as a f@#king church bell at this point?
We need to stop wasting time on hoping and wishing and praying, and start seriously preparing ourselves - and especially our kids - for what lies ahead. It really is the only option left...
you said it frank1569..............
Wow, I'm so grateful that our U.S. Congress is busily funding more wars for the Pentagon ... with mega-mega bucks now requested for CyberWars, and pretty much ignores the Climate Crisis, and continues to go for more oil and coal and weapons systems. Our leaders must be men and women of great faith as what they obviously can't manage to take care of ... like health care for everyone ... and coming water shortages ... and the effects of Climate Crises in the very near future, God certainly will take care of since GOD HAS BLESSED AMERICA and made it a CHOSEN NATION with a MANIFESTED DESTINY.
The compassionate, real-people actions the current administration and the congress seem to be dedicated to [how many Afghans and Taliban did we kill today? how many health care insurers can we placate today?] makes me feel SO SECURE and so special and blessed to be a U.S. citizen.
The words are: INSANE, DESTRUCTIVE PRIORITIES: ... LIFE-DENYING, LIFE-KILLING, MONEY-MAKING FOR A FEW ... and the MOST TOTALLY OUT-OF-IT, WARPED BUNCH OF DULL-WITTED WEASELS that this government has ever had at such a crucial time. And there never has been a time like this to play EARTHLY BRINKMANSHIP. Gee, that's a good title for a video game.
If I sound out-of-sorts, you got that right. Some days seeing THE WHOLE GLOBAL AND NATIONAL PICTURE and feeling the TRUE EMERGENCY of it is harder to handle than other days. This just happens to be one of them.
But, hey, everyone out there who is working so hard to make a difference, just keep on keepin' on. You are greatly respected and appreciated.
And afterall, Life is an adventure with CHANGE as the CONSTANT, so who knows?
/cm
"...as "refugee" is a term with legal connotations under the 1851 Geneva Convention."
And that would be what Geneva Convention? The Convention against Turbulence? The Convention against Planetary Rape?
And "legal connotations" in the U.N. context carry what force of law? Blather?
-30-
Many coastlines in tropical and sub-tropical regions are protected by coral reefs which are rapidly diappearing.
As man becomes more dependent on local ocean fisheries due to loss of agriculutral production, coral reefs, a primary source of fish for coastal communites, are destroyed through dynamite fishing and other harmful practices.
Very simply, fishermen will drop dynamite into the reefs and scoop up stunned fish. With thousands of miles of coral coast in underdeveloped countries, it's near impossible to control this practice. One stick of dynamite can eliminate millions of years of coral formation.
Coral reefs are important in protecting coastal communities
from storm surges. This will be an important factor as ocean levels rise and ocean temperatures rise.
The Weather Channel has taught us very well that tropical storms increase in intensity over warm waters. Hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico will increase in frequency and intensity.
We will see more storms in the Caribbean and in the Indian Ocean, where coastal communities have minimal protection.
While storms may not be a major factor, what will be the impact in the Mediteranean where most of the population lives at or near sea level ?
We will also see a reduction in wetlands along the coast and in river deltas ... Much of the African coastline is protected by mangrove stands, which will disappear due to increased demands for building materials and changes in sea level. We will also see coastal deserts moving along the coast line (i.e. from Somalia into Kenya), further destroying beneficial coastal vegetation.
The rise in sea level is just one of the factors to be considered in global warming. This rise will exacerbate many other forces that will act in concert to dispace a larger part of humanity.
The environmental catastrophes described in this comment and the first comment are moving ahead full steam. But few of them involve global warming.
Over-fishing, over-logging, over-irrigating, air and water pollution of various kinds are all real threats. Global warming (and the associated sea level rise) really aren't.
It's unfortunate that the Left and the environmental movement have bought into this myth so strongly. I believed it myself for 25 years, but it's not true. Look around - 2006 was cooler than 2005, 2007 cooler than 2006, 2008 cooler than 2007, and 2009 is starting off much cooler than 2008.
What happened is that greenhouse effect theory started being looked at seriously in the late 70s. The ensuing 30 years were part of a naturally occurring warming cycle, and the rising temps got attributed to the greenhouse gases. But the climatology and even the basic physics of the greenhouse effect are still not well understood and appear much less powerful than the IPCC's computer models predict. We are now in a 30 year cooling cycle, so make sure you have good winter clothes!
You can see many well-resourced articles on this at Wattsupwiththat, my new favorite science site. This article, http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/10/15/arctic-sea-ice-now-287-higher-than-this-date-last-year-still-cli..., reports that arctic ice levels are back almost to normal and still spreading.
Left and environmentalists forces need to focus on real issues at the intersection of social justice and environment, e.g. clearing rainforests and their indigenous residents to make room for cattle grazing. Unfortunately, as the world starts to realize that global warming was a scare story, the credibility of environmentalists will be much reduced. And they will realize it as temperatures keep going down.
Personally, I regret the boost that the right wingers will get from this. I hate being on the same side as Exxon, even in an intellectual debate. But it's energizing to know the world is not coming to an end, and we still have a real future to fight for.
I'm glad to get a chance to exchange comments with a "denialist." There's a strong group of them at "American Thinker," which banned me. These people claim the global average temperature is cooling, not warming.
The record high and low temperatures in the U.S. found at http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/records/index.php?ts=daily&elem=mint&month=2&day=0&year=2... turns the tables on the deniers. They resort to denying the validity of surface thermometer readings due to local influences like parking lots, air conditioning units, etc. But weather observers and scientists, who would be most likely to notice such effects, wouldn't go to the trouble and expense of collecting the data if changes in local conditions would make the results useless. It's reasonable to think such people move their thermometers or use other methods to offset urban heat effects, especially since the controversy has, so to speak, heated up.
From the web site linked above, I compiled the record highs and lows for the period from 1/07 to 2/09. The records include the allegedly very cool year of 2008. There were 52,107 maximum temperature records tied or broken during those 26 months, but only 23,849 minimum temperature records tied or broken. Check my figures if you doubt this.
There's no need to stock up on winter clothes, unless winter is coming. People who claim the planet's been cooling, but live where surface readings are taken, are deluded if they think the weather has been cooling where they live. This evidence tends to confirm global warming (but not necessarily anthropogenic global warming, I hasten to add).
I'm not saying GW is a slam dunk, but on balance, the evidence persuades me. Better measurements should put this controversy to rest in the next couple of years.
gee, sounds exciting.
this article fails to point out that in central mexico, for years now, lakes are drying up - if not being pumped full of raw sewage - quicker than many will acknowledge.
this article touches upon, briefly, the sad ending of glaciers and ice sheets that, once they're gone, will dry up rivers not only in the himalayan foothills but also in south america (already happening) and in new zealand and in any other place so currently fortunate to have this wonderful natural resource so readily available.
like it or not, folks, we're a doomed civilization. enjoy your vegan and your meat and your fish diets while you can. it's all a moot point.
When things get bad enough for all solutions to be considered, then I recommend we begin by revaluing Cannabis agriculture, manufacture and trade in the context of 21st Century crises. We must reverse the perception of value that has dominated our degenerative economic disrespect for the Natural Order and snap out of the confused perception that a "strategic food resource" can also be a Schedule One drug.
We all need to start utilizing Cannabis to its fullest potential, or go over the falls in synergistic collapse of environment, economics and social structures. Cannabis is far too valuable to be truly illegal. Unless mankind faces that reality, then in fact we are doomed much sooner and surer than anyone can imagine. If the nutritional and atmospheric benefits of Cannabis were the only things to consider they would be more than enough, but there's much much more.
Google "global broiling" if you need another thing to be really worried about. Fortunately, there is a solution, but it's an inconvenient one. And time is running out.