Australia Urged to Accept 3,000 Pacific Islanders Per Year Due to Climate Change

Dave Hoefler via UNSPLASH

The Australian government has been advised to create a new visa category to allow Pacific Islanders to relocate permanently to Australia in order to mitigate the impact of climate change. The recommendation was detailed in a recent policy paper published by the University of New South Wales’(UNSW) Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law.

The report’s authors Jane McAdam and Jonathan Pryke argue that adaptation alone is insufficient in the case of the many Pacific islands threatened by increasingly frequent and severe weather events as a result of climate change. They also stress that the proposed 3,000-per-year relocation target is far from radical, representing just a “drop in the ocean” in terms of displaced persons. 

"If you look at where the trajectory is, unless you have major changes in mitigation and adaptation efforts, we're likely to see more displacement occurring." - Jane McAdam

According to reports, Jonathan Pryke thinks “relocating even a small number of people on a voluntary basis would help ease pressure on vulnerable countries.”

Australia’s Department of Home Affairs declined to respond to a question posed by Australia’s national broadcaster regarding a new visa scheme, instead offering a generic commitment to existing migration pathways open to Pacific Islanders.

This UNSW policy paper involves many important issues, but perhaps the most obvious is its timely reminder that dealing with the impacts of climate change requires a multifaceted approach. While mitigation efforts, such as emissions reduction, are important, the impacts of climate change are severe enough to require adaptation as well, especially in small-island states. Policy recommendations like the UNSW report’s proposed visa scheme must be pursued alongside mitigation strategies if we are serious about addressing the climate crisis. 

Despite activists and policymakers discussing relocation of Pacific Islanders for at least a decade, the current government’s record of inaction is not reassuring. When bushfires raged across New South Wales and Queensland in last December, scientists said they were “bewildered” by the lack of focus on the climate crisis by politicians. This was over a year after a joint Medical Journal of Australia-Lancet report warned that Australian inaction on climate change was a public health threat. (ABC News - Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

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UN Launches Pioneering Climate Security Project in the Pacific

Pablo Garcia Saldaña via UNSPLASH

The UN, in partnership with Kiribati, Tuvalu and the Marshall Islands, launched a USD $3.2 million UN Climate Security Project yesterday as part of the UN Secretary-General’s Peacebuilding Fund (PBF), and is the first multi-country project of its kind in the region. 

The PBF is the UN financial instrument of first resort to sustain peace in countries and regions at risk of conflict or affected by conflict, including that caused by climate change. 

The project will provide 24-months of support to assess and begin to address critical climate security challenges faced by these three countries, including displacement and forced migration, resulting from livelihood loss, food security, coastal erosion, increased social tensions linked to shrinking land and tenure, and industries such as fisheries, as well as the ever increasing costs of responding to worsening natural disasters. 

In a quest to avert social conflict, the project will focus on tailored climate security assessments, including youth and gender-sensitive discussions and partnerships with key stakeholders. The project will be implemented by UNDP and IOM.

Khaled Khiari, the UN Assistant Secretary-General for Middle East, Asia and the Pacific from the Departments of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs and Peace Operations noted that “climate change in the Pacific has the potential to cause a myriad of cascading fragility and instability risks.” 

The three country leaders echoed the harrowing climate change challenges each of their countries are facing, all of which are only two meters above sea-level at their highest points. 

“This is about our survival, safety and security”

President of the Marshall Islands, H.E. David Kabua

Khiari noted the groundbreaking nature of the project, with which we certainly agree, and demonstrates the significant movement of the conversation of climate change to climate security within the UN security architecture, most notably within the UN Security Council, whose most recent debate on climate security was in July this year, and included a briefing by Pacific representative of the Climate Security Expert Network, covered in this Spotlight. (UNDP, FBC News)

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In Today's News: Record Global Displacements; Covid-19 Heightens GBV for Refugee Women; Climate Change Displacement in US; Employee Concerns for Climate Refugees Drives Google Carbon Reductions

Record 50.8 Million Internally Displaced, 5 Million from Natural Disasters in 2019

In its annual report, the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC) categorized the displacements as 45 million due to conflict and 5 million due to weather-related disasters. The past year marked a high of 33.4 million new displacements, the highest figure since 2012, with weather-related disasters accounting for 24.9 million new displacements and Asian countries and the United States recording the highest numbers. The displaced are now further threatened by the challenges posed by the Coronavirus, but even so, IDMC says the record numbers are indicative of collective global failure and calls on governments to solve long entrenched conflicts such as those in the DRC, Syria, Yemen and Afghanistan, which have displaced millions of people. They also suggest governments do more to tackle climate change and prepare for the real-life impacts they pose to displacement. Coronavirus cases are being tracked among displaced people in Iraq, where the first cases were confirmed, and in Syria, Burkina Faso and Colombia, all dealing with displacement crises and rising infection rates. (BBC)

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COVID-19: Displaced Women and Girls at Heightened Risk of GBV

The UN Refugee Agency is warning of the extra risks the Coronavirus pandemic’s lockdowns and movement restrictions impose upon refugee, displaced and stateless women and girls who are significantly at higher risk to intimate partner or gender-based violence. They warn that some are trapped with their abusers, while others lack documentation or have suffered livelihood loss as a result of the pandemic and may be forced into survival sex or child marriages. Within families, many women are also taking on increased responsibilities and burdens as caregivers. Survivors of violence and those at risk are also impeded access to psycho-social support, health and security services, including safe shelters, which have been temporarily suspended or re-purposed due to pandemic response. In partnership with humanitarian actors, governments must ensure critical services for survivors are designated as essential and accessible to those forcibly displaced, as well as access to justice mechanisms for those survivors of gender-based violence. (Gulf News) 

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US Displacement in the Face of Climate Change

In the United States, 1.2 million people were displaced by climate-related disasters in 2018. Where people live is increasingly being driven by climate change, and that, along with economic disparity, showcase how discriminatory systems adversely affect low-income communities of color and further propel gentrification. Now enter the Covid-19 crisis, which threatens to further stress those existing disparities with the largest number of US renter households since 1965, who lacking recovery assistance, are especially vulnerable to a potential displacement crisis. With an aim to understanding the links between climate change and displacement, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) conducted a literature review of 384 materials since the 1970’s, which revealed historical inequities in American states that persist to this day. One example is coastal states, where housing continues to be built more rapidly in flood prone rather than low risk areas. When flood displacements do occur, neighboring areas are also impacted due to the housing shortages which can’t keep pace with the displacement influx. Further, many low-income communities indicate barriers to climate change actions such as lack of money, resources and clarity on viable options. NRDC maintains that the environment, housing, health, racial equity and economic opportunity are linked but underscored that displacement and gentrification are not necessarily inevitable in making American cities climate ready. (NRDC) 

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Employee Concerns for Climate Refugees Drives Google Carbon Reductions

Since 2018, Google has made efforts to match every unit of energy it consumes with a renewable source on a 24x7 basis. Even so, employees found these efforts insufficient in the face of Google’s decision to maintain contracts with fossil fuel companies. In an open letter to the company, employees called for a “four-zeros” objective: zero carbon emissions by 2030, zero contracts for fossil fuel companies that extract oil and gas, zero funding for climate denying organizations and zero harm to climate refugees. Now, presumably in response, Google is working on a “carbon intelligent computing platform” already deployed to its data centers to shift non-urgent workloads to times of day when wind and solar energy sources are plentiful and thus, can be utilized. The company hopes it can ultimately be declared “24x7 carbon-free energy” in all its data centers, which it is almost close to achieving in Hamina, Finland. (ZDNET)

Note: Title of article changed by Climate Refugees to highlight relevance to climate displacement

In Today's News: Climate Displaced in Cox's Bazaar; Dengue Fever on the Rise; Are We Doing More Harm or Good When it Comes to Climate Migration Modeling?

Government Constructs 139 Buildings for Climate Refugees

Bangladesh is stepping up initiatives to protect 4,409 climate displaced people in Cox’s Bazaar refugee settlement, which the government is dubbing the largest refugee project in the world. A further 55 multi-storied buildings will be constructed across the country for ‘climate refugees’ in a quest to cut poverty, provide land, housing, and broad livelihood and development assistance to populations affected by natural disasters such as cyclones, floods and river erosion. (New Age Bangladesh)

Analysis:

Of course, Bangladeshi citizens internally displaced by climate change are classified as internally displaced persons even if for environmental grounds such as climate change.

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Are We Thinking About Climate Migration All Wrong?

Much of the existing climate migration modeling grabs our attention with its massive numbers of looming large-scale displacements, but can it also miss the details of the fuller picture, not just in terms of numbers, but also of the exact shape and form this displacement might take since it lacks scientific certainty, ultimately pushing policymakers, in the wrong direction?

For example, many experts expect the displacement to be internal and happen slowly over time, and usually not very far. Some experts feel that assigning an expected number helps to galvanize political will while others contend apocalyptic messaging fans the flames of existing nationalism and xenophobia spreading around the world. 

Francois Gemenne, a leading expert in this topic, contends that presenting the situation as something unmanageable fuels prejudices and invites government surveillance.” (Rolling Stone)

Analysis:

It should be noted that while most climate migration or climate displacement may be internal, multiple displacements or states’ continuous inabilities to meet the needs of displaced populations could bring about situations which force individuals to seek assistance and protection across borders.

Furthermore, an increasing area of concern in some urban cities like the Miami neighborhoods of Little Haiti and Liberty City is “climate gentrification” as one Harvard study put it, which explores whether natural disasters can make lower-income inland neighborhoods more attractive to wealthier migrants who seek to offset their risks to climate change by buying up real estate that risks “displacing” local residents in the process.

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WMO Warns Widespread Transmission of Dengue Due to Climate Change

Just as the coronavirus wreaks panic across the globe, the UN’s weather body, The World Meteorological Organization’s (WMO) report last week warned of the increased risk of dengue fever to about half of the world’s population due to rising temperatures and erratic rainfall, making it easier for the Aedes mosquito species to transmit the virus. Dengue is now the fastest spreading mosquito-borne viral disease in the world, increasing from only 9 countries in the world in the 1970’s to 128 countries that strikes 96 million people each year. 

Last week we shared the report’s findings that global hunger was on the rise as well as climate displacement, which internally displaced more than 6.7 million people last year. (The Pioneer)