Category: 2

The Asian Development Bank has recently published a report on the effects of climate change on migration in and from the continent. Although migration need not necessarily be a security concern, people can be propelled to move for reasons of personal safety, such as extreme weather events, or livelihood insecurity caused by long-term land degradation or river salination. This report provides a useful perspective on climate change, representing the conclusions drawn by an organisation based the region most likely to suffer the harshest consequences. To read the full report, click here.

Image Source: Amirjina

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To browse a list of all of the articles EXCLUSIVELY written for sustainablesecurity.org – follow this link

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To browse a list of all of the articles EXCLUSIVELY written for sustainablesecurity.org – follow this link

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The publication of the Strategic Defence and Security Review and the Coalition’s first National Security Strategy provided ample opportunity for the government to deliberate on the strategic implications of climate change for the UK.  Yet while claims that we continue to live in a post-Cold War ‘age of uncertainty’ lay at the heart of both documents, on  closer reading there is very little to suggest that uncertainty about climate change was a concern for those who conducted the review.  

Article source: RUSI

Image source: U.S. Geological Survey

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Writing exclusively for SustainableSecurity.org, Joe Thwaites takes an in-depth look at the discussion at the UN Security Council on the security implications of climate change. Joe analyses the debate over whether the Council is an appropriate forum for dealing with climate change discussing the views of both great powers and those who are set to lose most from a warmer global climate in the years ahead. 

Image source: United Nations

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Many leading military analysts in the United States are increasingly alert to the link between security and climate change. Is international terrorism really the single greatest threat to world security? Read more »

As reported by Agence France Presse, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has produced a draft summary of a report that warns of a predicted increase in the number and intensity of extreme weather events.  The 800-page report goes some way to addressing a subject largely untouched by their landmark 2007 report on climate change, and adds to the growing body of evidence outlining the potential security implications of a warmer planet.

Article Source: AFP

Image Source: Nasa

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Accelerating climate change and competition for limited supplies of water, food and energy are poised to ignite long-simmering conflicts in fragile states, monopolising the world’s military resources and hampering development efforts, security experts say. Defusing these new 21st century conflicts – or at least preparing governments and citizens to cope with them – will require a broad range of innovative interventions, a gathering at Britain’s Department for International Development (DFID) heard earlier this month.

Image source: Images.Defence.Gov.au

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Avoiding the coming catastrophic nexus of climate change, food, water and energy shortages, along with worsening poverty, requires a global technological overhaul involving investments of 1.9 trillion dollars each year for the next 40 years, said experts from the U.N. Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN-DESA) in Geneva Tuesday.

“The need for a technological revolution is both a development and existential imperative for civilisation,” said Rob Vos, lead author of a new report, “The Great Green Technological Transformation”. 

Article source: Terraviva

Image source: Paul Keller

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International Alert’s Janani Vivekananda discusses how climate change will will interact with other social, economic and political stressors to drive instability.

“Rather than climate change being this single, direct causal factor which will spark conflict at the national level,” Vivekananda said, these stressors “will shift the tipping point at which conflict might ignite.” In places that are already weakened by instability and conflict, climate change will simply be an additional challenge.

Source: youtube 

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