Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
Rising impacts
Academic studies, o
cial research consortia and several
think-tank projects
-
including those run at the Woodrow Wilson Center,
6
the Center for American
Progress
7
and the Royal United Services Institute
8
-
have all compiled extensive
data on the probable e
ects of climate change on security considerations. At the
end of 2012, the American Security Project published
Climate Security Report
,
which argued that the range of threats had intensi
ed and accelerated appreciably
in recent years.
9
The Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change (IPCC), published in September 2013, o
ered the
rst assessment
of climate change e
ects for six years, and reinforced the message that e
ects were
beginning to be profound. The report provided a more
ne-grained assessment of
di
erent regions, although admitted that models still could
not get to country-level predictions.
10
The most common prediction is that climate change will intensify the frequency
and magnitude of natural disasters. The landmark Stern review predicted that 200
million people globally will be a
erential impacts in di
oods.
11
The
Climate Vulnerability Monitor
calculates that climate-induced natural impacts
already claim 350,000 lives a year and render 50 countries acutely vulnerable, and
estimates that a business-as-usual scenario would leave 132 states su
ected by climate-driven droughts and
ering high
vulnerability and cause 1 million deaths a year by 2030.
12
In 2012 the IPCC
cult to predict.
13
argued that these
uctuations have become more extreme and di
The portion of the IPCC
s Fifth Assessment Report published in March 2014
places particular stress on the security risks of climate change.
14
The
Global Climate Risk Index
has ranked Honduras, Myanmar, Nicaragua and
Bangladesh as the world
'
s most vulnerable countries; statistics since 1992 also
show Portugal (20th), Italy (24th) and Spain (32nd) high on the list of countries
at risk.
15
Global Humanitarian Forum also argues that heat-waves,
'
oods, storms
and forest
res will be responsible for as many as half a million deaths a year by
2030, 310 million people su
ering adverse health consequences and 20 million
more falling into poverty.
16
The Red Cross has called for early warning systems,
more extensive
exible and drought-resistant agriculture and provi-
sions for refugees; there is, it argues, a need to
ood-walls,
'
build climate risk management
into all our decision-making
.
17
One of the main drivers of climate-induced con
'
ict will be food. The Interna-
tional Food Policy Research Institute projects an increase of between 10 and 20
per cent in the number of people at risk of hunger as a consequence of climate
change. By 2025 nearly 1.5 billion people will face crop scarcity and 2 billion
water scarcity.
18
International Alert director Dan Smith argues that recent price
rises have cancelled out a century
'
s advances in food accessibility and in terms of
