New Delhi (NVI): By 2050, more than 200 million people will be forced to leave their homes due to disasters and other climatic adversities, experts believe.
According to the experts, 28 million people were displaced internally in 148 countries in 2018 and 61 per cent of them were dislocated due to disasters and 39 per cent due to conflict and violence.
These assessments and statistics are part of the State of India’s Environment annual report released in Rajasthan by Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot.
The experts say that with increasing intensity and frequency, natural disasters now affect more than half of India’s population, both in rural and urban areas.
The State of India’s Environment report adds that the continuity and intensity of extreme weather events in India in 2018-19 has taken even climate scientists and meteorologists by complete surprise.
The world witnessed around 286 and 228 extreme weather events in 2018 and 2019, respectively. Of these, India recorded 23 in 2018 and 9 in 2019.
In terms of casualties, 48 per cent of the deaths in Asia due to extreme weather events were witnessed in India.
And in 2019, comparatively more people died in India even though the number of extreme weather events were less.
Extreme weather events include conditions like drought, wildfire, flood, landslides, extreme temperatures, fog and storm.
The State of India’s Environment report said, “The continuity of extreme events from one month to the next means that the world needs to always be on its toes. Scientists and environmentalists have called this a climate emergency.”
Sunita Narain, director general of CSE said “Climate change impacts are the tipping points as the poor are already living on the margins. Increased inequality is adding to stress; rural economies are dying. Weather-related events will drive people to the point of no return — they will join the hordes of migrants. We know this from the number of illegal settlements in our cities today.”
According to the National Disaster Management Authority, 27 of the 37 states and Union territories are disaster-prone.
Some 68 per cent of the cultivated land is vulnerable to drought, 58.6 per cent landmass is prone to earthquakes, 12 per cent to floods, 5,700 km of the coastline is prone to cyclones and 15 per cent of the area is susceptible to landslides.
The 2011 Census shows that 405 million (or 33 per cent) of the country’s population are on the move, with some 9.9 million people migrating from one state to another every year.
Displacement or rise in migration due to disasters has raised concerns on increasing human trafficking. It is a known fact that in countries like India, there have been clear evidences of linkages between disaster, migration and vulnerability to human trafficking.
The UN Environment Programme estimates that trafficking goes up by 20-30 per cent during disasters. Large-scale migration is also increasing xenophobia and intolerance around the world.
