In a recent Foreign Policy magazine column, Diana Roy, the Latin America and immigration writer at the Council on Foreign Relations, outlines the reasons for why more countries need to officially recognize climate refugees.
Despite growing numbers of climate-displaced people, “very few countries offer them specific protections,” notes Roy.
“Some research forecasts that more than 1 billion people—roughly an eighth of the world’s population—could be at risk of displacement by 2050, largely due to natural disasters and climate change,” she writes.
The current scope of the term “refugee” “is insufficient to address the large number of people who will be displaced by the global climate crisis, leaving them without legal protection or access to asylum,” Roy argues.
“A new global humanitarian immigration pathway that recognizes the unique challenges that climate-displaced individuals face—such as a lack of legal status and insufficient resources for resettlement—would facilitate the development of domestic and international policy frameworks that protect and assist this growing population.”
The Immigration and Refugee News Digest 