Two academics at the University of Worcester are part of a global research project looking at climate-induced migration and building resilience for communities.
The groundbreaking £2.3million three-year research project, Climate Adaptation and Resilience Strategies (CLARS), aims to address the challenges of climate-induced migration and enhance the resilience of both migrants and host communities in the Lake Victoria Basin – Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania – and Great Lakes Region – USA and Canada.
It is predicted that more than 200 million people will be forced to move due to the impacts of climate change in the next 25 years. Increasing evidence suggests such migration is already happening with the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre recording more than 32.6 million displacements in 2022 alone, 98% of which were the result of weather hazards like flooding and wildfires.
The CLARS research project will bring together a team of researchers from the UK, US, Canada, and Germany. Among them are Dr Cedric Nkiko and Professor Alan Dixon from the University of Worcester. Along with Dr Laurie Parsons, from the University of London, and Dr Andreolla Serraglio, from Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, they will focus their part of the research on the Lake Victoria Basin.
“By understanding how communities in the Global South, such as the Maasai, have been dealing with climate change for a considerable length of time, we aim to learn from their extensive experience,” said Dr Nkiko. “Overall, this will enrich our comprehension of climate adaptation and boost the resilience of migrants and host communities globally.
“For example, in the US, droughts in the Southwest, hurricanes in the Gulf region and sea level rises on the East and West Coast are pushing migrants to the Great Lakes Region in search of abundant natural resources. This research hopes to help city planners and host communities prepare and manage for such migrating activities in both lakes regions.
“We hope that the outputs of the project will extend beyond both lakes’ regions, benefiting communities worldwide, leading to comprehensive databases related to climate migration and contribute to providing actionable recommendations for policymakers.”
Until now there has been little research that looks at the full impacts of climate-induced migration, including on both the migrants themselves but also the receiving communities. And rarely have those in the global North sought to draw on the climate-induced experiences of those in the global South.