There's no place like home: human displacement and climate change.

• Author: Millar, Ilona

Abstract

Forced migration of human populations due to the impacts of climate change poses an enormous challenge for the world community and international legal system to accommodate. At present there are no coordinated legal and administrative systems that will allow populations displaced by climate change impacts to migrate in a planned and orderly manner. However, in the absence of such systems, here is a risk that displacement will be accompanied by conflict and political instability. This article explores these emerging and uncharted issues in four parts. Part 1 of this article explains the impacts of climate change on small island developing States ('SIDS') and how these impacts may be drivers for migration both within and from island nations. Part 2 focuses on legal frameworks specifically established to address displaced persons, in particular the formal protection and rights afforded to refugees and migrants. Part 3 considers the international legal regime that has been established to deal with climate change, a regime that, to date, has not addressed issues relating to human displacement. Part 4 considers the special circumstances of people migrating in response to climate change, looking at legal initiatives being explored to respond to this looming issue.

Introduction

Each year over 32 million people are forced to leave their homes to seek permanent or temporary residence in other parts of their own countries and in new countries in response to political, social, economic and environmental forces. (1) Some of these people will meet criteria agreed to by the international community and will be given refugee status. Others will receive humanitarian assistance from organisations such as the United Nations ('UN') or complementary protection from other States. Many will go through formal, legal channels to achieve temporary or permanent migrant status and some will arrive in a new country, seeking asylum. International law has developed to respond to these different circumstances. It has not, however, fully developed to respond to some of the new triggers that are driving displacement, such as environmental degradation and climate change-related events.

The United Nations University claims that by 2010 as many as 50 million people will be seeking to escape the effects of environmental degradation. (2) Norman Myers (3) and major environmental groups, such as Friends of the Earth, note that climate change, in particular the likelihood of increased extreme weather events and sea level rise, is likely to lead to significant increases in the number of environmentally displaced people, or so-called 'environmental or climate change refugees', citing figures in the hundreds of millions of people. (4) Whilst these figures must be treated with caution, bearing in mind that the links between environmental degradation and unregulated population movements are not well established, (5) they nevertheless highlight the fact that many people, and in some instances whole communities, may be displaced as a result of environmental change.

Small island developing States ('SIDS') are among the most vulnerable countries in the world to climate change due to their geographic isolation and susceptibility to natural disasters and climatic extremes. The increased frequency and intensity of extreme weather events and sea level rise has the potential to affect the long-term ability of humans to inhabit many of the atolls and islands that constitute these States. In Vanuatu (6) and the Carteret Islands of Papua New Guinea (7) whole villages are in the process of being relocated due to oceans inundating low lying areas and contaminating fresh water supplies. Many other islands in the Pacific and Indian Oceans and the Caribbean Sea are facing the possibility of relocation in the future. Indeed, governments of some of the countries most likely to be affected by climate change impacts, such as the small island nation of Tuvalu, are already trying to make arrangements for the acceptance of their citizens in other States as their own countries become uninhabitable. (8)

There is no well-established legal basis upon which States are obliged to assist people displaced by climate change under international law. By exploring the application of traditional refugee and migration laws, a number of legal and non-legal scholars have demonstrated that these areas of law are not well suited to respond to the particular circumstances of global warming. (9) Despite calls from some developing countries, Parties too the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change ('UNFCCC') (10) have also shied away from considering human displacement under their mandate.

Using the small islands of the Pacific as a reference point, this article explores the international legal frameworks that touch upon the rights and obligations of countries and citizens affected by climate change-induced displacement and migration and considers (i) whether the concept of an 'environmental or climate refugee' is appropriate; (ii) whether new legal regimes to afford protection to those persons should be developed unfit international law; and (iii) if so, what is the most appropriate forum to develop such regimes.

Part 1 of this article provides a background to the impacts of climate change on SIDS and looks at how these impacts may drivers for migration both within and from island nations. In addition, it highlights the pressures and tensions that may arise as a result of ever shrinking territory and how these could contribute to mounting instability within countries and the region. Part 2 focuses on legal frameworks specifically established to address displaced persons, in particular the Convention Relating to the status of Refugees (11) and the formal protection and rights afforded to refugees and migrants. This section looks at the legal definition of a refugee and explores why so called 'environmental refugees' do not meet it. Part 3 then considers the international legal regime that has been established to deal with climate change-the UNFCCC and its Kyoto Protocol. This section notes that, to date, parties to the UNFCCC and the Kyoto Protocol have not addressed issues relating to human displacement, but that some of the guiding principles of the UNFCCC may be particularly relevant to any future regime that addresses climate related displacement. Finally, Part 4 considers the special circumstances of people migrating in response to climate change, looking at legal initiatives being explored to respond to this looming issue.

From both a humanitarian and a security perspective, it is imperative that all countries begin thinking about the impacts that climate change will have on human movement both domestically and within regions such as the Asia-Pacific. This paper aims to demonstrate that existing refugee and humanitarian laws do not extend adequate protection to persons displaced by climate change. Therefore, new approaches need to be developed at an international level and implemented nationally, drawing upon some of the key features of refugee and migration law, in particular mechanisms to afford protection to displaced people, but also drawing upon human rights principles, principles of sustainable development and concepts of environmental justice.

(1.) Rising Sea Levels and Small Island States

Small island developing States and low-lying countries are already suffering greatly form the impacts of sea level rise, resulting from the thermal expansion of the world's oceans and glacial melt which is caused by human-induced climate change. In 2001, the Intergovernmental Panes on Climate Change ('IPCC'), in its Third Assessment Report, highlighted that sea level rise of the magnitude then projected (i.e., 5 mm yr(-1), with a range of 2-9 mm yr (-1)), could be expected to have disproportionately great effects on the economic and social development of many SIDS, In fact, land loss from sea level rise especiaily on atolls in the Pacific and Indian Oceans and low limestone islands in the caribbean Sea, might be of such a magnitude as to disrupt virtually all economic and social sectors in these countries. (12) In extreme circumstances, sea level rise and its associated consequences could trigger abandonment and significant and significant off-island migration at great economic and social cost. (13)

In December 2007, the IPCC presented its latest findings to the parties to the UNFCC assembled in Bali, Indonesia, The IPCC's Fourth Assessment Report ('AR4') (14) again highlights the extreme vulnerability of SIDS to future climate change and sea level rise due to their limited physical size, geographic isolation, susceptibility to natural disasters and climate extremes, and low adaptive capacity. Significantly, the AR4 specifically notes that sea level rise could lead to a possible reduction of island size, particularly in the Pacific. (15)

The IPCC estimates of global average sea level rise by the end of the 21 st century range between 0.18 and 0.59 metres. (16) However, some scientist are concerned that accelerated melting of the polar ice sheets, on century rather than millennial time scales, could cause metres of sea level rise, resulting in major changes to coastlines and inundation of low-lying areas, with the greatest effect in low-lying deltas and low-lying islands. Even the conservative figures offer a catastrophic glimpse into the future for many small island countries in the Pacific and India Oceans-many of whom have much of their national land area less than five metres above sea level. For example, the Maldives, in the India Ocean, consists of some 1,3000 small island that are only an average of 1 to 1.5 metres above mean sea level (17) Over 80 per cent of the Maldives' land area is therefore less than one metre above sea level. (18) The Maldives has a total population of approximately 269,000 people and has one of the highest population densities in the...