How climate-induced disasters are creating a new dynamic of migration

Subject : Environment

Context-

Disasters, mostly weather-related and potentially due to climate change, are displacing more people than wars and conflicts.
Internal migration is picking up:216 million people will move within their countries by 2050, says a World Bank estimate.

Climate- change induced migration-

International Organization for Migration (IOM) says-
- climate change-induced migration will not be limited to a country’s borders. This is changing the migration pattern globally.
- As many as 55 million people were internally displaced within their countries due to extreme weather events in 2020.
- The World Bank estimates that, by 2050, the impact of the climate crisis, such as poor crop yields, a lack of water and rising sea levels, will force more than 216 million people across six regions, including sub-Saharan Africa, south Asia and Latin America, from their homes
- Overtime, urban centres of a country will overload with migrations and people will move to other countries, legally or illegally. This is started to happening now.
- The international community can no longer implement migration and development policy without considering the impacts of climate change.
- Migration is already accepted as an adaptation tool.

Repercussions of interstate migration-

Local administrations or states have mechanisms that not just facilitate but also protect migrants and their right to pursue livelihoods.
In India’s chronic drought-prone areas, migration for daily wage has evolved as a key source of income.
Indian states such as Uttarakhand and Odisha are adopting schemes and programmes to rehabilitate people from disaster-prone areas.
There are several inter-state agreements to facilitate and protect the rights of migrant workers.
These steps have developed on the community’s adaptation strategy to migrate for survival.
With increasing climate disasters, this adaptation reaction will be seen at planetary level.
This will further precipitate the immigration crisis.

Suggestions to adapt the changing migration patterns-

Several ongoing initiatives — including the Warsaw International Mechanism Task Force on Displacement (WIM TFD), the Sendai Framework, etc — should be coordinated to increase understanding of, and response to, growing risks of climate-induced migration / displacement and exposure to modern slavery.
Migration or mobility due to climate change has to be accepted under the “loss and damage” definition of the climate framework.