Adaptation and Risk Analysis

The first two articles of our ‘Under the Weather, On the Move’ blog series talked about the various considerations in conceptualising climate migration, and why migration is usually not the first adaptation strategy when facing a combination of climatic and non-climatic risks.

Human mobility in the context of environmental impacts has been gaining increasing attention. Our blog series ‘Under the Weather, On the Move’ seeks to demystify climate migration by exploring some of its key aspects, intersectional variations, and policy angles.

In this first article, we discuss how climate migration can be broadly defined.

World Environment Day reminds us—the contributing species to pollution on planet Earth—that the environment can be preserved through mindful actions and addressing harmful human activities.

In the context of this year's focus on combating plastic pollution, the United Nations Environment Programme has strongly emphasised the significant role of individuals in accelerating the shift to a plastic-free world.

It will be fair to say that many of us are looking forward to the monsoon season this year, eager to put behind us one of the hottest summers ever on record. With each passing year, India has been experiencing more and more instances of severe heatwaves, rendering these months more and more dreadful.

About a year ago, Bengaluru witnessed some of the worst floods in its history. Amidst many ad hoc measures, the state responded with excavators, removing encroachments on storm water drains (SWDs). It is clear now that none of the piecemeal solutions have worked. Rainfall over the last couple of weeks has seen flooding reoccur in the same parts of the city as the previous year. We often blame climate change for the mess we are in, and to some degree, this is justified. However, climate change always manifests through complex socio-ecological changes on the ground.

The relationship between climate change and migration is intricate. The first article in our ‘Under the Weather, On the Move’ series talked about the context and conditions within which people move or do not move. Establishing migration as a layered phenomenon, it further discussed how climate change impacts are diverse and closely linked to experiences of identity and sociocultural norms.

The world is grappling with intensifying climate change — temperatures are rising, weather patterns are changing, and extreme events and natural disasters are becoming frequent.
We are in the climate decisive decade, and we must act now.

March 2023 was the second-warmest March for the world in the last 174 years, says the March 2023 Global Climate Report by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). With the seventh-warmest January and fourth-warmest February (in the last 174 years) also being this year — as reported by NOAA — 2023 has, indeed, had a warm start. So, are warmer years becoming a reality?

A study by the Center for Study of Science, Technology and Policy (CSTEP)—a Bangalore-based think tank—on the climate of eastern India underscores the need for climate risk mapping and climate action. The study ‘District-Level Changes in Climate: Historical Climate and Climate Change Projections for the Eastern States of India’ projects changes in temperature and rainfall patterns in Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha, and West Bengal—the eastern states of India—over the next three decades compared to the historical period (1990–2019).

The Center for Study of Science, Technology and Policy (CSTEP)—a Bengaluru-based think tank—published a study on the climate of north-eastern India titled ‘District-Level Changes in Climate: Historical Climate and Climate Change Projections for the North-Eastern States of India’. The study projects changes in temperature and rainfall patterns in Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim, and Tripura over the next three decades (2021–2050) compared to the historical period (1990–2019).