The effects of climate change could make at least one billion people homeless between now and 2050, says the charity Christian Aid.

The group expects climate change to deepen an already worsening global migration crisis.

In a report, the charity says it fears the wave of migrations will generate new conflicts in areas of the world where resources are most scarce.

The migration crisis in poor countries is not recognised, says Christian Aid.

In a report to mark the start of Christian Aid week, the charity says that forced migration is now the most urgent threat facing poor people in the developing world.

It says “a world of many more Darfurs is the increasingly likely nightmare scenario” and the impact of climate change is the great and frightening unknown.

The report’s main author, John Davison, says we hear a lot about people trying to come to European and other rich countries, but the real crisis is developing a long way away and remains little recognised.

The charity points out that most of those on the move will have to remain in their own countries as internally displaced people with no rights under international law and no voice – in many cases their lives will be in danger.

Christian Aid is calling for “a stronger, braver response” by the international community if the worst effects of the crisis are to be averted.

Link to BBC NEWS | Special Reports | Charity warns of migration crisis

Climate change is already affecting people across Africa and will wipe out efforts to tackle poverty there unless urgent action is taken, a report says.

D roughts are getting worse and climate uncertainty is growing, the research from a coalition of UK aid agencies and environmental groups says.

Climate change is an “unprecedented” threat to food security, it says.

It calls for a “climate-proof” model of development and massive emissions cuts to avoid “possibly cataclysmic change”.

The report, Up In Smoke 2, updates previous research from the organisations – Oxfam, the New Economics Foundation and the Working Group on Climate Change and Development, an umbrella group of aid and green groups.

It says that although climates across Africa have always been erratic, scientific research and the experience of the contributing groups “indicates new and dangerous extremes”.

Arid or semi-arid areas in northern, western, eastern and parts of southern Africa are becoming drier, while equatorial Africa and other parts of southern Africa are getting wetter, the report says.

The continent is, on average, 0.5C warmer than it was 100 years ago, but temperatures have risen much higher in some areas – such as a part of Kenya which has become 3.5C hotter in the past 20 years, the agencies report.

Andrew Simms, from the New Economics Foundation, said: “Global warming is set to make many of the problems which Africa already deals with, much, much worse,” he said.

“In the last year alone, 25 million people in Sub-Saharan Africa have faced food crisis.

“Global warming means that that many dry areas are going to get drier and wet areas are going to get wetter. They are going to be caught between the devil of drought and the deep blue seas of floods.”

He added that the “great tragedy” was that Africa had played virtually no role in global warming, a problem he said was caused by economic activity of the rich, industrial countries.

Mr Simms said unless climate change was tackled all the “best efforts” to help Africa could come to nothing.

One of the biggest threats is growing climate unpredictability, which makes subsistence farming difficult, the report says.

The average number of food emergencies in Africa per year almost tripled since the mid 1980s, it points out.

But it says that better planning to reduce the risk from disasters, together with developing agricultural practices that can withstand changing climates, have been shown to work and could help mitigate the impact if used be more widely.

‘Overwhelming’

Up in Smoke 2 also laments the failure of industrialised governments to help developing countries adapt to climate change.

Between $10bn (£5.2bn) and $40bn is needed annually, the report says, but industrialised countries have given only $43m – a tenth of the amount they have pledged – while rich country fossil fuel subsidies total $73bn a year.

The agencies say that greenhouse emissions cuts of 60% – 90% will ultimately be needed – way beyond the targets set in the Kyoto agreement.

“Climate change is overwhelming the situation in Africa… unless we take genuine steps now to reduce our emissions, people in the developed world will be condemning millions to hunger, starvation and death,” said Tony Juniper, executive director of Friends of the Earth.

The report comes two weeks before a key summit on climate change in Nairobi, where delegates will look at the progress made on the Kyoto agreement that requires industrial nations to cut their emissions by an average of 5.2% from 1990 levels by the period 2008-2012.

Delegates will also consider what system should be adopted when the current period ends.

Link to BBC NEWS | Africa | Climate change ‘hitting Africa

The poorest people in the world will be hardest hit by the effects of climate change, experts at a major conference on global warming have said.

The warning came ahead of the publication of a key report on climate change by hundreds of environmental experts from around the world.

Agreement on the report was reached after days of debate in Brussels.

The report concludes climate change is already having major impacts on the natural world.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) believes there is also a discernible, though less marked, impact on human societies.

Objections

Outlining the report’s findings, Dr Martin Parry, co-chairman of IPCC Working Group II, said evidence showed climate change was having a direct effect on animals, plants and water.

“For the first time, we are no longer arm-waving with models; this is empirical data, we can actually measure it,” he told a news conference.

Dr Parry outlined the four areas of the world now thought to be the most vulnerable to climate change.

“The arctic, where temperatures are rising fast and ice is melting; sub-Saharan Africa, where dry areas are forecast to get dryer; small islands, because of their inherent lack of capacity to adapt and Asian mega-deltas, where billions of people will be at increased risk of flooding,” he explained.

As a result, the most severe impacts will be felt by the world’s poorest countries, the report says.

“The poorest of the poor in the world… are going to be the worst hit and are the most vulnerable in terms of impact of climate change,” said IPCC chairman Rajendra Pachauri.

Mr Pachauri said those people were also the least equipped to deal with the effects of such changes.

Year of reports

Scientists and government officials from more than 100 countries met through the night, trying to agree on the wording of a summary for policy makers.

Several delegations, including the US, Saudi Arabia, China and India, had asked for the final version to reflect less certainty than the draft.

The report will be sent to world leaders in time for a G8 summit of industrialised nations in June.

It is the second in a series of IPCC reports coming out this year, together making up its fourth global climate assessment.

The first element, on the science of climate change, released in February, concluded it is at least 90% likely that human activities are principally responsible for the warming observed since 1950.

The third part, due in May, will focus on ways of curbing the rise in greenhouse gas concentrations and temperature.

A fourth report in November will sum up all the findings.