2021 closed with yet another year of record forcibly displaced persons and the climate crisis played a major role driving over 84 million people out of their homes. 

We already know that in 2020, three times as many people - 30.7 million - were internally displaced by the climate crisis than by conflict or violence. Numbers over the last decade don’t fair any better either, where twice as much displacement was triggered by weather-related events than conflict or violence. The trends tell us people are being forcibly displaced, forced to migrate and wherever possible, migrating to survive.

All eyes were on Afghanistan in 2021 with millions more displaced and fewer evacuated, as the Taliban re-gained control of the country. While power shifted, climate vulnerabilities continued, where one of the country’s worst droughts in its second year, has displaced many and rendered over 50 percent of the country food insecure. 

Many have left for Iran, some parents sending their children ahead to help the remaining family left behind survive. Others are forced to migrate, but leave their children behind in yet another option for family survival. 

One of the displaced Juma Gul says, “we have nothing, sometimes we find food and sometimes not. We eat only dry bread and green tea. We can’t buy flour or rice, it’s too expensive.”

In Mexico and Central America, nearly one million people have now fled the compounding effects of violence, the pandemic, gangs, poverty and climate change in what the UN Refugee Agency called “unprecedented.

Pakistan is one of the most climate-vulnerable countries in the world, even if its 2020 share of global emissions is less than 1 percent. Last July, Jacobobad in the Sindh Province surpassed temperatures too hot for humans to withstand. Climate displacement and climate-induced migration will only increase under present conditions, where one report estimates climate inaction could result in as many as 600,000 displaced people by 2030. Beyond the obvious humanitarian crisis such displacement and migration could bear for the country and region, there’s also the geopolitical shifts that follow demographic shifts as populations move. 

That’s exactly what has happened in Iraq, where drought-induced displacement from rural to urban centers has shifted demographics in the country, where the population has hit its highest peak of 41 million, with nearly 70 percent of the country residing in urban centers.

The population is projected to double by 2050, straining resources, including water supplies. Water scarcity already displaced more than 200,000 Iraqis in 2019, and below-average rainfall, along with rising temperatures, expected to rise by two degrees over the next decades above the 1.5 degrees Celsius threshold, are just some of the unjust climate impacts that lay ahead. 

Somalia is no stranger to conflict nor drought, but its latest drought is like none other faced before, according to Oxfam’s local NGO partner WASDA. 

"I have been involved in droughts since 1991 and I have never seen a drought that has impacted people as badly as has this one," executive director Aydrus Daar told Oxfam. "Many pastoralists have lost 100% of their livestock. This has never occurred in living history."

Three failed rainy seasons in a row have failed to yield crops, sustain livestock and drinking water, leaving 90 percent of the country in water shortages and forcing thousands to flee in  survival, searching the country for water and food, and forcing a federal government emergency declaration in November. 

Over 5.9 million Somalis are in need of humanitarian assistance due to conflict, climate shocks, and the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic. Over 116,000 people were displaced by floods between October 2020 and March 2021. Over ten years of drought has left over half the hungry deeply food insecure. 

In South Sudan, flooding displaced over 800,000 people, while cyclone Tauktae in May last year forced 200,000 people to move when it struck several southeast Asian countries, India, Sri Lanka and Maldives the worst. 

Hurricane Ida in the United States was regarded by some as the most financially destructive weather event of the year. Thousands of people across Louisiana, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and more were evacuated, killing 95 people and sustaining $65 billion in losses. 

Western and central Europe saw floods that killed 240 people and widespread damage exceeding $43 billion. 

In China, the July floods in the Henan province killed 302 people, displaced more than one million people, and thousands more lost their homes. 

Climate-related displacement is happening all over the world, regardless of country GDP, and the world must step up its climate mitigation, climate adaptation and compensation for loss and damage. 

But there’s a need to recognize the particular vulnerability within low and middle-income countries that are battling mutually reinforcing crises that heighten their vulnerability. In places where entire populations are impacted by extreme poverty, economic inequality, disease, disasters, conflicts and more, governments and people are left with increasingly fewer tools and options, let alone solutions. 

Those who can migrate do so to survive, but by no means do most find better situations. Climate refugees and climate migrants are often victims of exploitation, even slavery. Still other migrants may find the move in search of employment from rural to urban centers has yielded even worse conditions than those at home. Those who can’t afford to migrate - a far larger number - are increasingly trapped in terrible situations.

We can reverse this annual trend of increasing forced displacement with a galvanized public that demands policy change rooted in justice. International climate policy must center on high-emitting countries immediately lowering their emissions.

Climate finance must focus on fair compensation for losses and damages caused by climate change. Climate adaptation funding must be scaled, provided in grants in flexible and accessible ways. We need to move funding away from its current siloed approach, linking climate finance instead to humanitarian, development and disaster-related aid. Solutions must always be locally-led, truly supporting local communities instead of donor interests. 

Above all, it is long past time for global citizenry and for our public actions to recognize that international migration and refugee policy often reflect geopolitical realities that are completely unjust. Our work must build movements that work to change these systems from within if we are to build true and lasting climate justice.