Presentation as part of workshop on Climate Change & Displaced People run by Catherine Bolinga (Papua New Guinea) and Natalie Lowrey (Australia), Masters students from the MHRD Asia Pacific program. Between 9-13 May 2016 the fourth edition of the Global Classroom was held in Lido, Venice, Italy at the European Inter-University Centre of Human Rights and Democratisation (EIUC). This annual event is part of the activities carried out by the Global Campus partners in order to promote education and research on human rights and democracy worldwide and to provide a forum of discussion and additional tools of academic interaction. The Global Classroom theme for this year was Intractable human rights situations and failed international responses to crises. The 2016 Global Classroom gathered professors and students from the seven Regional Master’s programme of the Global Campus which take place in five continents. Also in attendance were international experts from the United Nations and civil society organisations. The international forum focused on presentations and discussions about complex human rights situations around the world that have arisen from persistent and unresolved conflicts, natural disasters, and the lack of regional or international collective responses to crises. Current and intractable crises around the globe, including different responses from international community to these highly complex human rights situations, were discussed from different angles and persepctives. These included the refugee crisis in Europe, the Mena region and the Asia Pacific, a comparative analysis of the socio-economic situation of Burundi and Rwanda and the human rights crises in Haiti. MHRD Asia Pacific Global Classroom paper: http://bit.ly/AsiaPacificPaper Presentation - Plight of refugee and refugee like situations in Asia and Pacific: http://bit.ly/AsiaPacificPresentation Presentation for Climate Change and Displaced People workshop: http://bit.ly/ClimateDisplacement

1. CLIMATE CHANGE
AND DISPLACED PEOPLE

2. • Rising emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and
other greenhouse gases are trapping more heat
in the atmosphere and oceans — rapidly changing
the global climate
• As oceans absorb more CO2 they become more
acidic, threatening to undo marine food chains
• Since the 1880s, the world’s oceans have become
30 per cent more acidic and have risen by about
20 centimetres. Sea levels continue to rise.
• CO2 is released when we burn fossil fuels — such
as coal, gas and oil — or when forests are cut
down
• In March 2015, the world hit a dangerous
milestone when the average concentration of CO2
in the air surpassed 400 parts per million (ppm) -
40% higher than CO2 levels before the Industrial
Revolution started
What is Climate Change?

3. • United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate
Change (UNFCCC) and the
Kyoto Protocol
• The Asia Pacific Partnership
and agreements under the G8
• December 2015 Paris
agreement consolidated
years of negotiations with
agreement among 188
countries to limit carbon
dioxide emissions
• Policy responses have
been led by international
negotiation - so far largely
ineffective at the national
level
Action on Climate Change

4. • Rising sea levels will make many
small island states uninhabitable
• Droughts and water scarcity
will ruin crop productivity in
traditionally fertile regions
• Increase in floods and the intensity
of storms will destroy essential
public infrastructure
• Extreme weather — not warfare,
volcanoes, or tsunami — is now the
primary reason human beings are
displaced.
• Droughts, wildfires, floods,
powerful hurricanes, superstorms.
Displaced 157.8 Million People
From 2008 to 2014
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)

5. • Climate change will force people to
flee their homes, villages, cities and
countries on an unprecedented
scale
• UNHCR predicts that in the
coming decades, climate change
will become the biggest driver
of population displacement
worldwide
• The number of people displaced by
climate change will greatly outstrip
existing flows of refugees
• No international consensus or
legal framework been developed,
to deal with this expected mass
movement of people
Climate change impacts and forced displacement

6. • People displaced by climate change
do not fall under the narrow
definition of ‘refugee’ in the 1951
Refugee Convention
• Little political mobilization to
amend the definition of ‘refugee’
• The United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate Change
(UNFCCC) also fails to address
the situation of those displaced by
climate change
• UNHCR recommendations on
addressing human mobility in the
context of climate change were
scrapped in the final text of the
Paris Agreement
Action on Climate Displacement

7. • Nansen Principles developed in 2011
is the most promising international
framework
• The Principles contain a broad set of
recommendations ‘to guide responses
to some of the urgent and complex
challenges raised by displacement in
the context of climate change and
other environmental hazards’.
• Efforts to embed these principles in a
new binding international agreement
have so far been unsuccessful
• Norway and Switzerland established
the Nansen Initiative to build
consensus among interested states
about how best to address cross-
border displacement
The Nansen Principles

24. PACIFIC ISLAND NATIONS
Estimated 665,000 - 1.7 million Pacific Islanders will be
displaced or forced to migrate by 2050
Rising sea levels
Criticism of developing nations carbon emissions

41. QUESTIONS
1. What is the situation in regards to climate change in your region?
2. How is it being addressed in your region?
3. What are the human right impacts of climate change in your region?