The World Bank’s latest report predicts the unbelievable changes in people’s behaviour due to inevitable climatic changes. In 20-40 years, the civilization will continue to face reduced agricultural production, water scarcity, rising sea levels and other adverse effects of climate change. All of them will ould force 216 million people to migrate by 2050.
The World Bank (WB) includes three new regions in its recent report, Eastern Europe and Central Asia, North Africa and East Asia and the Pacific. The document provides a “global estimate” of the scale of potential migration, said Juergen Voegele, the WB’s vice president for sustainable development.
“If countries start now to reduce greenhouse gases, close development gaps, restore vital ecosystems and help people adapt, internal climate migration could be reduced by up to 80 percent — to 44 million people by 2050,” he added.
In other words, the government should take decisive actions to avert the upcoming crisis. As WB says, there could be “hotspots” of climate migration that will emerge as soon as within the next decade and intensify by 2050. People will be forced to leave places that can no longer sustain them and go to areas that offer opportunity, that is the problem.
World Bank about the future of a planet
Moreover, the trajectory of internal climate migration in the next half-century depends on our collective action on climate change and development in the next few years.
“Not all migration can be prevented and… if well managed, shifts in population distribution can become part of an effective adaptation strategy, allowing people to rise out of poverty and build resilient livelihoods,” Voegele said.
The WB estimates that by 2050, internal migrants due to climate change could hit
- 86 million in sub-Saharan Africa,
- 49 million in East Asia and the Pacific,
- 40 million in South Asia,
- 19 million in North Africa,
- 17 million in Latin America and
- five million in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
