By Christian Wolff

The interconnections between climate change and human mobility have lately been discussed with increasing fervor and frequency. ACT Alliance and its members have been working on this issue for several years. Now, in collaboration with ACT member Bread for the World, we are publishing a new analysis entitled, “Addressing the Protection Gap – Human Mobility and the Climate Crisis in International Frameworks”, compiled by Dr. Katherine Braun as lead author.  

There is growing recognition that climate change affects people’s ability to move and their decisions about movement, and that, apart from addressing the root causes of climate change and ensuring climate justice, more equitable access to safe migration opportunities is needed, alongside strengthened protection for people on the move, or those unable to move. ACT and our partners and networks have made considerable progress in advocating for this over the last few years – as reflected in the recent agreement to establish a loss and damage financing facility, or in the inclusion of a framework for more diverse and more easily accessible regular pathways in the Global Compact for Migration.  

The next steps in our journey towards positive change for affected populations will lie in furthering our common understanding of how their diverse needs in different contexts can best be served and their human rights and dignity can be most effectively protected. Some of the answers to this will be found in climate change processes, others in humanitarian approaches, still others in global and regional migration policies. The report attempts to provide an overview of how the underlying issues are connected, and how advocates – including our membership and allies – can best use the different international frameworks to make rights-based progress on this topic. In doing so, it examines the place of human mobility in climate policy, its treatment in international human rights instruments and in migration governance, as well as looking at implications for financing. 

Please follow this link to access the report. We also invite you to read this blog post by the lead author and our Bread for the World colleague Sabine Minninger. 

Christian Wolff is the ACT Alliance Migration and Displacement Programme Manager