Environmental Future
A deteriorating environment could drive about 50 million people from their homes by 2010 and the world needs to define a new category of "environmental" refugee, a U.N. study said on Tuesday.
Desertification, rising sea levels, flooding and storms linked to climate change might displace hundreds of millions of people, according to the report by the U.N. University's Institute for Environment and Human Security.
"We're ringing a kind of scientific and political alarm bell," Janos Bogardi, head of the Bonn-based Institute, told Reuters. "We need to act."
He said the estimated figure of 50 million environmental refugees -- roughly the population of Ukraine or Italy -- was in some ways a worst case that would demand billions of dollars in extra aid.
Still, he estimated that about 20 million people were already displaced by problems linked to a damaged environment, ranging from eroded farmland to polluted water supplies.
Such upheavals already affected millions of people in sub-Saharan Africa, India and Asia, he said.
The Institute urged acceptance of the idea that "environmental refugees" -- people displaced by environmental degradation -- would be eligible for food, tools, shelter, medical care and grants in line with political refugees fleeing war or oppression at home.
October 12, 2005 6:56 AM | Category: Global Warming