climate change

The Paris agreement that entered into force in 2016 after COP21, set a limit to global temperature increase at 2°C above pre-industrial levels; the report by IPCC, published in October 2018, updated this value to 1.5°C, to avoid extreme climate scenarios for future generations.

As many as the residents in the Netherlands, roughly. Or like the combined population of Croatia, Ireland, Norway and Finland. As for its magnitude, the severe drought hitting the Horn of Africa and affecting more than 18 million of its people may end up being the worst in the last 50 years.

Two plights, both sunk into oblivion: climate change and humanitarian crises are two of the most neglected tragedies currently affecting Africa far and wide. In February FAO, the UN specialised agency for food and agriculture, declared that nearly 224 million Africans are suffering from malnutrition because of climate change and conflicts. Lately, the number has increased by over 20 million.

The war that has been ravaging South Sudan since 2013 has forced 3.5 million people to flee their homes: 1.7 million escaped to other countries (Ethiopia, Sudan, Uganda) and 1.9 million sought refuge in other parts of the country. Figures from UNHCR (the United Nations High Commission for Refugees) are terrible. And even more so when you think that behind those numbers are personal tales of violence, exhaustion, uprooting, family strife and, above all, poverty.

The complex impacts of climate change on human mobility have gained increased attention, but an invisible and growing number of people are also being displaced – paradoxically – by the very measures taken in the name of addressing it.

In the last forty years the Lake Chad Basin has hosted one of the gravest humanitarian crises on the African continent.