The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) reported that 2024 was the hottest year on record, topping off what was also the hottest decade on record, underscoring the need to address climate-caused migration. The year 2024 also saw historic storms, flooding, and drought. These climate-related challenges have exacerbated conflicts, famine, and disease, and in turn, we are witnessing the sharp increase in people forcibly migrating over borders and within their own countries.

Within this context displaced communities have been made vulnerable, their lives threatened and torn apart, demonstrating the importance of addressing climate-caused migration. This crisis should call philanthropy to the needs of climate-related migrants but to do this we need to center our practices around those impacted by climate change, and to do so from the start.

The Complexity of Addressing Climate-caused Migration

In the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Global Trend Report published in June 2024, it was estimated that 111.7 million people were forcibly displaced within their countries, from their homes, and across borders by the end of 2023. Of those displaced, 83.8 million migrants (75%) were considered ‘currently residing in countries with high-to-extreme exposure to climate-related hazards,’ and the UNHCR estimated that, on average, 21.5 million people were displaced annually by weather events between 2008 and 2016, showing the urgent need to address climate-caused migration.

Yet despite these estimates, one of the biggest challenges to addressing climate displacements is understanding the complexity and scale of related migration. Even calculating the number of climate-based migrants is made difficult by the fact there is no legal definition of a ‘climate refugee’ or ‘climate migrant’ as defined by the 1951 Geneva Convention.

There’s more and more attention to climate change and philanthropy. There are new funders coming in all the time.

Similarly, attempts at clarification have not been aided by a common misconception that migration always entails movement across borders when studies have shown that the majority of migration is within a country of origin. In the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (iDMC)’s most recent report in 2024, the organization found 75.9 million people were internally displaced in 2023 with 7.7 million being due to disasters including climate-related catastrophes.

Read the full article about addressing climate-impacted migration by Elisa Shoenberger at Alliance Magazine.