We cannot sit and stay helpless staring at this international climate stalemate. It is now time to take action. We need an emergency climate pathway.
I speak for my delegation. But more than that, I speak for the countless people who will no longer be able to speak for themselves after perishing from the storm. I also speak for those who have been orphaned by this tragedy. I also speak for the people now racing against time to save survivors and alleviate the suffering of the people affected by the disaster.
Yeb Sano, Philippines delegate to the United Nations Climate Change Conference, Warsaw, 2013
A rickety boat of refugees is turned away from port after port in country after country until after months of searching for safe haven the ship crew gives up and abandons its passengers, leaving them adrift in the Andaman Sea with no food or water and only scant hope of rescue. Meanwhile, the capital of Bangladesh sees thousands of new people migrating in from their homes in the countryside, which is slowly being overtaken by rising seas. Elsewhere, Asia’s teeming urban centers and sprawling slums are dangerously close to oceans, and a single flood can devastate town after town. In Asia, multiple refugee crises are currently underway, but they are all too easily forgotten by the media.
Asia is vast beyond comprehension, and with its immense size comes great and varied vulnerabilities to climate change. The continent with the greatest population in the world, it is also unfortunately home to the greatest number of people who will be affected by climate change—most notably, sea level rise.
Table 8.1. Countries with the Greatest Populations Affected by Sea Level Rise
Country |
Pop. affected (millions) |
China |
85 |
Vietnam |
32 |
India |
28 |
Indonesia |
23 |
Bangladesh |
22 |
Japan |
21 |
United States |
17 |
Egypt |
12 |
Brazil |
11 |
Netherlands |
10 |
Climate Central, the nonprofit news organization that reports on climate science, analyzed sea level rise data under a number of different scenarios, depending on how quickly the world moves to stem fossil fuel emissions. Alarmingly, all Asian countries take top positions in the data. The six countries that will have the greatest population affected by sea level rise are China, Vietnam, India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, and Japan. These countries contain much coastal, low-lying land. Over two hundred million people in those countries live on land that will be affected.1
Much like in the drowning Pacific Islands, the connection between climate change and displacement in Asia is impossible to deny. Sea level rise is unstoppable; the only questions are how much we can reduce the rate and what countries can do to adapt.
Adaptation to sea level rise—creating sea walls and barriers, moving cities inward—is unquestionably expensive. Low-lying developing countries like Bangladesh and Vietnam particularly vulnerable, projected to lose a far greater proportion of their GDP than other Asian countries. But for Asian residents of every socioeconomic status, measures taken to protect coasts from sea level rise will be less expensive in the long run than the economic damage that would happen otherwise.2
It is not just sea level rise that makes Asia the most vulnerable to global warming; tropical cyclones, drought, intense rain and hail, and more also come into play. Many Asian countries rank among the most vulnerable on the Notre Dame Global Adaptation Index, which ranks countries by their vulnerability to climate change and least able to adapt to its impacts.3
Indeed, the impacts of sea level rise will be far-reaching and multi-pronged. Low-lying coasts will be slowly inundated. River deltas will flood, coastal wetlands will be destroyed, agricultural areas will be rendered ungrowable. Floods in cities will damage infrastructure; floods in lowlands will ruin crops. Already the beaches are being slowly chipped away. Coastal communities will have much to face, and they already are, as can be seen in Myanmar and Bangladesh in alarming ways. Residents of the communities on the coast of Bengal Bay, off the Indian Ocean, are already being forced to abandon their homes to face the dangers at sea.
In spring and summer 2015, boats carrying thousands of refugees from Myanmar drifted in the middle of the Bengal Sea with nowhere to go. They were fleeing ethnic persecution in their home country and subsequently were turned away from Indonesia and then Malaysia. Thailand would not allow any Myanmar refugees during this period of mass exodus. They were Muslims, turned away from their country, where they were recognized as citizens. They would cry out for food and water to the Thai officials who passed by. On one boat ten passengers died during the months they were adrift after the boat’s captain and crew had abandoned them.
Just as Syria has the image of the washed-up toddler boy, Asia has its own poster child for climate change—hundreds of them, stranded on boats, banished from their destinations and consigned to life on the perilous seas, often referred to in the media as “boat people.” Oftentimes, boats of hundreds or thousands of refugees are at sea for months, unable to find port. Many have been abandoned by the ship crews without food or water, still more have capsized.4 It is an exceedingly dangerous journey, but the refugees who have been forced to leave Myanmar and Bangladesh have nowhere else to go.
Many of the people fleeing are being persecuted for their religious views—particularly, the Rohingya, the Muslim minority that resides in Myanmar and Bangladesh. They are a stateless people; the government of Myanmar has denied their citizenship since the Burmese nationality law in 1982. Only in recent years, the government has cracked down on persecuting them, placing them into camps or throwing them into jail if they do not call themselves Bengali. Across the border in Bangladesh, they face even more persecution, as they are usually considered illegal migrants,5 or the government lets them sit in refugee camps for years and years without a plan for an eventual home.6
And they are being turned away from Malaysia, Indonesia, and Thailand and left to float in the sea, with minimal supplies of water and food. Malaysia and Indonesia have announced they would turn away boats of refugees. Thailand has stopped several refugee boats from making port; refugees instead have to be smuggled in and are at great risk of being arrested. After Thailand cracked down on human smugglers, boat crews abandoned refugees in the middle of the sea. It was a “potential humanitarian disaster,” Jeffrey Savage, a senior protection officer with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, told the New York Times.7 Human Rights Watch has called it a dangerous and deadly game of “human ping pong.”8
Yet it took such a deadly game and subsequent public outcry to make any progress on protecting the refugees at sea. At the behest of the United Nations, countries in Southeast Asia, including Indonesia, Thailand, and Malaysia, gathered to discuss the crisis in early 2015. These three countries had turned away an estimated eight thousand refugees from making land in their country. Turning away the boats full of migrants, with no food or water, would transform the ships into what the United Nations secretary-general Farhan Haq called “floating coffins.”9 The governments of Indonesia and Malaysia agreed to allow some of the migrants to come ashore. The United Nations called it an “important initial step.”10 But a temporary Band-Aid will not heal the long-term problem.
There is another aspect to the plight of the Rohingya. The majority of the Rohingya reside on the quickly degrading coast of the Bay of Bengal, where sea level rise is a daily reality. Many refugees are the destruction of their communities.
When migrants aren’t risking the illegal, deadly trip at sea, they are moving inland. As has been seen in Syria and in Africa, farmers who can no longer make a living in the degraded coastal plains in the countryside have been forced to move to urban centers. However, the cities are packed, so migrants are forced into the slums. As a result, Dhaka—the capital of Bangladesh—has faced a population explosion, and its infrastructure is struggling to keep up.11 One slum, Korail, is home to seventy thousand people. Families there live in one-room shanty huts that are poorly held together. The sewage system is nonexistent in most of the city, which is worrisome beyond just living in a smelly hut. When the rains pour during monsoon season, the water overflows the sewage system, allowing diseases to run rampant with common outbreaks of malaria and cholera.
This is no ordinary hardship. Life has not always been like this for Dhaka’s newest slum-dwelling climate refugees. Dhaka, including its surrounding areas, is one of the fastest-growing megacities in the world.12 An estimated three and a half million people—40 percent of Dhaka’s population—lives in slums. A full 70 percent of the slum dwellers moved there after experiencing environmental difficulties in the countryside, according to the International Organization for Migration.13
It has long been common for rural dwellers of Bangladesh to move to Dhaka slums temporarily as a way to earn money, but as the impacts of global warming worsen, it is becoming harder for those residents to move back. Coastal flooding ruins rice paddies and destroys crops. Saline water damages the water supplies. Storms have demolished homes and communities. Climate change is forcing people to move to Dhaka and stay there.14
Life is perilous in the crowded cities. Those who are lucky enough to get a job work under horrible conditions. The garment industry—the source of clothes for the likes of Tommy Hilfiger and the Gap—is prominent; sweatshops are widespread. In April 2013 the Savar building in the Rana Plaza collapsed, killing 1,134 people inside and injuring thousands of others.15 It was the worst industrial accident ever to happen in the garment industry. It caused public outcry around the world, leading to political charges for the garment industry for the first time; in the past, there would be no charges for smaller accidents. The building owner and government officials faced murder charges.16 Yet years later, working conditions in Bangladesh’s garment factories are not much better.17 And even under safe working conditions, workers are often paid less than two dollars a day. They start at minimum wage, which is the equivalent of thirty-seven dollars a month.18 Clean water is hard to find; without flowing taps, slum villagers have to purchase it from middlemen at fifty times its usual price. They live in houses made of bamboo stilts in the most flood-prone areas. In the case of a storm or cyclone, they are the most at risk.
Unable to find refuge in Indonesia and Malaysia, the Rohingya and others then head for Australia. The trip to Australia is expensive and dangerous. After Australia loosened its refugee restrictions in 2008, the number of trips—and the number of deaths—multiplied. About nine hundred people died at sea in the following five years.19 Many get lost; Australians have urged their government to expand its search and rescue operations.20 But Australia’s policies on asylum seekers are particularly harsh. Labor leader Bill Shorten announced in July 2015 that it would turn back refugee boats.21 This follows years of that party’s harsh attitude toward refugees: in 1992 Labor prime minister Paul Keating wanted there to be mandatory detention for unauthorized arrivals.22 One last potential refuge for the boat people has proven to a pipe dream.
Over one-quarter of Myanmar’s borders consist of coastline.23 The country borders the Bay of Bengal, which extends northward from the Indian Ocean. Nearby countries bordering the bay and the ocean include India, Bangladesh, Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia. Millions of people living in these countries will be affected by coastal flooding and sea level rise–related land loss. Anywhere from thirteen to ninety-four million people will be living in coastal populations that will experience floods. One meter of sea level rise, which is a conservative estimate, will put 4.1 million people at risk. In Bangladesh’s Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna river delta alone, more than one million people will be directly affected by sea level rise by 2050, well before the one-meter rise is predicted.24 In a possible worst-case scenario, Bangladesh will lose one-quarter of its land area, displacing thirteen million people by 2100.25
Huge river deltas and surrounding areas in Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam are at risk of decay. The deltas are being slowly degraded as sea levels rise and storms batter the beaches, flooded by both overflowing rivers and the rising ocean during extreme precipitation events. Cyclones cause acute damage as well. The deltas, which contain deposits of sediment brought from water sources upstream, are normally replete with nutrients, thus they act as an important agricultural resource. But saline water brought in from storm surges and coastal flooding can render them infertile.
Two-thirds of Bangladesh is “basically a vast river plain,” according to the United Nations’ Nansen Initiative. That area is less than five meters above current sea level and is expected to experience frequent flooding as sea levels rise.26 Two hundred fifty million poor rural farmers live in the surrounding low-lying plains, whose livelihoods depend on fertile, productive soil.27
Two large rivers cut through Bangladesh: the Ganges (called the Padma in local language) from the Indian border and the Brahmaputra from Tibet. It is the largest delta in the world. It is also fed by the huge network of smaller rivers that feed into the basin, dubbed “100 Mouths of the Ganges.” Every year during monsoon season, the region degrades; rivers flood with force, entire riverbanks collapse, fields and homes are washed away. River erosion has erased and displaced entire villages that sit on the low-lying plains. The rivers are known to carve out new paths or grow deeper into their current paths. The “old Ganga,” or “Buriganga,” is a river that was once connected to the Ganges River but today lies forty miles away.28 This process of eroding river plains has historically been accompanied by rebuilding; one riverbank turns into a river, and the silt carried by that river forms a new island elsewhere. But the “rebuilding” process happens at a lesser scale each year. The region is unable to react to the erosion in time due to greater levels of water runoff and because of the area’s hydropowered dams, which trap the silt and sediment that would otherwise move down the river. There is a scientific consensus that the greater levels of water runoff are more to blame than the hydropower dams.29
In its fourth assessment on the state of climate change, the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) noted that there is strong agreement that sea level rise will accelerate the degradation of the deltas.30 Huge swaths of land will disappear by 2050, particularly surrounding river deltas in Asia. In Bangladesh, more than three million people around the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna delta may become displaced. In Vietnam, up to seven million of the eighteen million people living along the Mekong delta may be forced to leave by 2050.31 In Thailand, the delta surrounding the Chao Phraya River has sunk in parts to 1.5 meters below sea level already; it is possibly the worst delta affected by ground loss in the world.32
Multiple reports throughout the years have predicted the number of people who will be displaced due to the consequences of climate change.33 They may come to slightly different conclusions, taking different variables and projections into account, yet they all seem to agree on one thing: of all the continents, Asia will have far and away the most people displaced by climate change.
For the past several years, natural disasters have displaced more people in Asia than any other continent. Asia is home to 60 percent of the global population, but between 2008 and 2013, 80 percent of the global population of displaced persons were from Asia; in 2013 that number jumped to 87 percent.34 Disaster risks are most highly concentrated in Asia and will only become more so. As Jan Egeland, secretary-general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, said: “This increasing trend will continue as more and more people live and work in hazard-prone areas. It is expected to be aggravated in the future by the impacts of climate change.”35
Sea level rise is often cited as the greatest risk to Asia, and for good reason. If China, for example, does not adapt to sea level rise, an estimated half million people will be forced to leave their homes and communities. The good news is that adaptation is not only feasible but also economically viable in China, and if carried out, it will prevent a large percentage of the vulnerable population from having to move.36 There are multiple ways to adapt to sea level rise, including building dikes to prevent submergence and rebuilding beaches to prevent erosion. Port cities will also have to be upgraded, their infrastructures and buildings lifted.
Figure 8.1: Disaster displacement by continent, 2008–2013. Source: Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre.
Adaptation makes economic sense as well; it will reduce the financial damages that will incur from sea level rise and cyclones dramatically. These regions will need every bit of finance they can get to adapt and prevent the worst of climate change, so every dollar invested will come back in multiples.37 Infrastructure adaptation is a good way for protecting people who would otherwise migrate in climate change scenarios. Before going further into adaptation, it is worth taking a look at the multitude of risks that Asia will face.
Huge coastal cities are the norm in East Asia. Famous for its towering skyscrapers and packed streets, where when a city runs out of room it accommodates by simply extending its already existing buildings up and up, East Asia is full of teeming urban metropolises. Most of them are extremely vulnerable to sea level rise—Singapore and Hong Kong are excellent examples.38 The condensation of packed people and packed economic value means that when sea levels rise, people in these areas will face proportionately greater damages. In East Asia there are twenty-three cities on the coast that are home to more than one million people. Fourteen are in China, six in Japan, and three in Korea. In those cities, twelve million people and $864 billion in economic assets are at risk when it comes to sea level rise.39
In Japan, residents fled heavy floods in September 2015, when the city of Joso was hit by unprecedented rain that displaced at least one hundred thousand people from their homes. After storm surges burst through riverbanks and flood barriers, a tsunami-like wall of water swept through the town, tearing houses from their foundations.40 The intense rains also led to more than sixty landslides in the region.41
Japan, along with other coastal areas in Eastern and Southern Asia, can generally expect to see worse floods as the world warms.42 Flood damages are expected to increase greatly. Already Japan spends an average of $240 million to repair coastal damage from typhoon-related flooding and winds.43 About one and a third million Japanese people will be at risk of coastal flooding.44
Warmer air holds more moisture, and in Japan’s case a large block of stationary humid air led to the record-breaking precipitation that prompted the evacuation of thousands. In just days, the region saw more rainfall (twenty inches) than double the amount that normally occurs in the entire month of September.45 There will be fifteen fewer rainy days per year but greater total precipitation, meaning more drought punctuated by heavy storms.46
While most Asian countries do not face the same existential threat as many Pacific Islands, sea level rise will slowly—or, by some estimates, not so slowly—chip away at the coastlines, degrading them and destroying them and swallowing up the land. Every inch of sea level rise erodes many times as much land; in some areas in Asia, thirty centimeters of sea level rise will erode forty-five meters of coastal land. In Boreal Asia—northern China, Japan, and the Koreas—the coasts are expected to recede about six meters per year.47 Sea level rise assaults on the coastlines are palpable, very visible, and very damaging.
Rice has long been intertwined in the culture of Asia. For millennia it has been grown, consumed, and mythologized. It has inspired art throughout the ages and is discussed in Asia’s oldest scriptures. As one Chinese tale has it, several great floods wiped out the land and destroyed its plants, leaving little too eat. After the floods had drained, a dog came through with rice seeds hanging from his tail, which were planted, and food was restored to the land. Thus there is a Chinese adage that says, “The precious things are not pearls and jade but the five grains,” where rice comes foremost.
Rice is abundant in Asia because of the region’s ideal growing conditions, scattered with river deltas and monsoon-fed paddies. Most rice needs to be grown in paddy fields, parcels of arable land that remain mostly flooded in two-foot-deep water for at least a month. The river deltas and monsoon-fed grass of Asian flatlands help to sustain these ideal growing conditions. Outside the river deltas, farmers have carved grassy steppes, or terraces, into the Himalayan mountainsides, where glacial runoff provides the area’s main source of freshwater.
Rice is the lifeblood of Asia’s agricultural economy. Millions of farmers and others in the industry rely on it to make a living. It supports the highest level of agricultural population. In addition, Asians have historically relied on rice for the majority of their calories. One could easily argue that it is a food that has fed the most people in the history of agriculture.
Therefore it is troubling that Asia’s rice economy, which produces and consumes nearly the vast majority of the world’s rice, could be threatened by sea level rise.48 While rice thrives in wet conditions, and even requires land to be partially submerged for at least a month, it cannot survive if flooded too much for too long.
Nearly 88 percent of the world’s rice supply is produced in the low-lying deltas in South and Southeast Asia.49 These deltas are especially vulnerable to climate change. Vietnam grows nearly half of its rice in the Mekong River delta alone; the entire delta area would be impacted by sea level rise. Vietnam’s Mekong River delta provides 40 percent of the country’s agricultural production and 50 percent of its agricultural exports.50 Within the Mekong delta lands, 80 percent of the population lives in rural areas and 76 percent are engaged in agriculture.51 In Indonesia, flooding has reduced agricultural output by 1.3 million tons, a loss of about US$353 million per year.52
The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) predicts that by 2050, rice production levels will decrease by up to 15 percent worldwide and prices will increase by up to 37 percent. The impacts of sea level rise will entail more than simply flooding arable lands. The frequent flooding of river deltas irreversibly changes the region’s hydrology, and major flooding events are expected to increase in rice-growing areas.53
Rice agriculture is also sensitive to heat and could suffer under warmer global temperatures. High temperatures reduce rice growth productivity; already, higher temperatures have stagnated rice production levels in Southeast Asia. Every degree centigrade increase in global temperature results in a 10 percent drop in rice yield in some areas; in the Philippines this statistic is 15 percent.54
China is home to 10 percent of the world’s wetlands. But these wetlands are disappearing at an alarming rate, nearing what American Association for the Advancement of Science writer Christina Larson called the “critical red line.”55 The wetlands are not only home to valuable fisheries, but they are also an important source of fresh, clean water. In addition, they work as vital flood control mechanisms, helping to mitigate lands and cities further inland.
Yet over half of China’s wetlands have disappeared due to economic development and coastal reclamation. And over the past forty years, 13 percent of China’s lakes have disappeared. As a result, half of its cities do not have a good source of clean drinking water.56 It took decades of wetland destruction before the government decided to do anything about this problem, but today the Chinese government is working to restore valuable wetlands and preserve what few remain. The National Wetland Conservation Action Plan designated fourteen new wetlands sites, with environmental groups aiming to increase this number to fifty. Doing so will benefit ecosystems of China’s giant rivers, including the Yellow, the Yangtze, and the Yarlung Tsangpo, which turns into the Brahmaputra in Vietnam.57
Given the ravages of climate change, some wetlands in China and Japan are considered un-savable. There is no easy way to protect them from the impending sea level rise as there is with dry lands via sea walls and infrastructure. Wetlands are dependent on a certain amount of moisture and precipitation,58 yet too much permanent submergence will kill vital plants and habitats. The Asian Development Bank’s wetland adaptation analysis estimates tat Japan will lose about 28% of its coastal wetlands by 2050 while the losses in the PRC and the Republic of Korea will be 19%–22% by 2050, independent of adaptation choices.59
While many agricultural fields will be threatened by rising seas and extreme precipitation, others will be parched for water. As mentioned in previous chapters, China faced terrible droughts that accelerated the world’s grain prices and helped catalyze the Arab Spring uprisings and led to civil unrest spreading across the Middle East. But of course droughts have an impact on the country’s residents themselves and the surrounding region.
China is the world’s largest wheat producer and consumer.60 Its historical drought in 2010 led the government to purchase wheat on the international market, for fear of crop losses. This in turn is what led to global wheat price spikes in other markets, including Egypt, infamous for its bread riots. In addition to increasing global food prices, the Chinese drought severely affected the local economy. The Chinese government attempted to ameliorate the situation by providing $2 billion in aid to farmers, pledging upward of $15 billion, but aid does not cause the rain to fall.61 Farmers were forced to move if they were not too old and had the resources to do so.
India has also faced long hardships with widespread climate change–induced drought. India’s junior finance minister, Jayant Sinha, called climate change “the number one risk we face,” particularly regarding how it will affect monsoons and drought. India’s agricultural sector comprises nearly $370 billion and hundreds of millions of jobs and is heavily dependent on the monsoons during the rainy season to replenish the region with water.62 Three-quarters of the rain in India falls during monsoon summer months. Now monsoon rain patterns have become more erratic and unpredictable. In 2012 the Punjab region saw rain levels nearly 70 percent below average. The government was forced to import many food staples in response to low food production. Yet that solution only serves to drive up food prices to unaffordable rates and hurt the farmers who have no crops to sell.
For many Indian farmers, life has become truly unbearable, so they have turned to what may seem to be the only way out: suicide. Suicide among farmers is common in central India. The suicide rate among Indian farmers is 47 percent higher than the national average.63 Extreme weather—both drought and downpours of rain and hail—leads to crop failures, which leads to debt, which leads to a cycle of crippling poverty with no end in sight, to many farmers, except death. The number of farmer suicides tends to increase after extreme weather events.64 Environmental activists, most prominently environmental activist Vandana Shiva, have blamed the suicides on the system of genetically modified (GMO) crops. Monsanto requires farmers to purchase new seeds each year and has raised the price 8,000 percent since their GMO crops were introduced. Shiva has been working to provide non-GMO seeds to farmers so they can stay out of debt traps and be less dependent on Monsanto.65
Farmers take out loans against their land to borrow enough from local money lenders to pay for Monsanto’s seeds, but if they aren’t able to cultivate the crops they need to, they wind up in a debt trap. They rely on praying for a good season to grow the crops they need in order to pay off their loans. But with extreme weather and flash floods happening more often, the likelihood of such a season is becoming all the more rare.
As with floods, droughts are starting to damage Asia’s rice economy. Water scarcity harms more than twenty-three million hectares of rice in South and Southeast Asia. Droughts are expected to recur more often and extend further into irrigated lands.66
Many rice farmers are more concerned about droughts than floods. Scientific researchers and food organizations have been developing varieties of rice that can survive in drier conditions. While normally dependent on flooded fields, new forms of rice can survive even in dry months. The Asian Development Bank, which is carrying out much of this research in conjunction with International Rice Research Institute, notes that rice is the staple food for a huge portion of the people living in Asia and plays a “key role” in ensuring food security there.67 As an example, it points to farmers in Bangladesh, where drought is one of the biggest threats farmers face.68 Will this keep possible climate refugees at home?
With climate change expected to drive people into Asia’s urban centers, it’s worth looking at the risks they will face once they arrive. As in Bangladesh, this can lead to troubling patterns—migrants forced into slums, working in sweatshops under dangerous conditions. But Bangladesh is not alone. Most of the world’s largest megacities—cities with a population of multiple millions, some say ten million or more—reside in Asia.
The global population is rapidly urbanizing and cities are struggling to keep up. Yet climate change’s impacts on cities are no laughing matter. Cities are more vulnerable to food insecurity and poverty traps. Many Asian megacities are in high-risk locations: on the coasts. It makes sense why they would form there, because coastal cities have long been meccas of economic activity and sea-wide trading, the economic hubs of cross-country trading. But they will face hardships as the seas continue to rise.69
The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) predicted the cities that would be most at risk of flooding in terms of exposed population by 2070. Of the top ten, just one city is not in Asia: Miami (which is ranked ninth). The others, in order: India’s Kolkata and Mumbai take the top two ranks, Bangladesh’s Dhaka, then China’s Guangzhou, Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh City, China’s Shanghai and Bangkok, Myanmar’s Yangon, and Vietnam’s Haiphong.70 In a different study conducted in conjunction with the World Bank, the OECD also ranked cities most vulnerable measured as a percentage of GDP, and once again Asian cities take top rank: (1) Guangzhou; (2) New Orleans; (3) Guayaquil, Ecuador; (4) Ho Chi Minh City; (5) Abidjan; (6) Zhanjing; (7) Mumbai; (8) Khulna, Bangladesh; (9) Palembang, Indonesia; and (10)71 Shenzen.
Table 8.2. Global Cities with the Greatest Populations Exposed to Sea Level Rise
City |
Pop. exposed in 2070 (millions) |
Kolkata |
14 |
Mumbai |
11.4 |
Dhaka |
11.1 |
Guangzhou |
10.3 |
Ho Chi Minh City |
9.2 |
Shanghai |
5.5 |
Bangkok |
5.1 |
Rangoon Myanmar |
5 |
Miami |
4.8 |
Hai Phong |
4.7 |
Many lists of cities most vulnerable are ranked in terms of predicted economic damage. But in terms of people, Asian coastal cities are far and away most at risk. When considering population movements and migrations, sea level rise is the more important factor to discuss here.
Twelve million people dwell in Mumbai, India, which sits on a set of islands and has a drainage system that is more than 150 years old.73 Floods during the monsoon summer months are already near the level of the subway.74 The city is surrounded by a set of gates that close during high tides to prevent flooding, but during periods of intense rains, floods have nowhere to go. The East-West Center, a nonprofit established by Congress in 1960, described the situation there as “near panic” in such cases. One meter of sea level rise will cost Mumbai an estimated $71 billion.75
Ho Chi Minh City is home to eight million people, and that figure is projected to grow to upward of twenty-two million by 2050. Accounting for 40 percent of Vietnam’s GDP, the city is already vulnerable to floods; in 1997 half of its population was affected by floods. In 2050, thirty-year-flood events are expected to impact millions, even “create 2 million ‘climate refugees,’” according to the East-West Center.76
Hundreds of thousands of people were forced to evacuate from Manila, in the Philippines, in 2009 after rains brought by Typhoon Ketsena inundated 80 percent of the city.77 The East-West Center notes that many officials in Asian coastal cities are simply not aware of the risks of flooding or how much these risks are going to compound over coming years as population growth and urbanization increase and sea levels rise. This must be overcome before we can expect cities to implement life-saving flood-protection measures that will become increasingly important.
These cities will require significant investment in basic amenities and living infrastructure. More than half the population of many of these cities are crowded in slums that lack basic protections from floods. Without investing in basic amenities and infrastructure, climate change will worsen vulnerabilities.78
Adaptation is becoming common among discussion at global governance levels. The World Bank, for instance, has released their recommendations for city-specific solutions to climate change risks, noting that “cities need to make a proactive effort to consider climate-related risks as an integral part of urban planning and to do so now.”79 City-specific solutions including “infrastructure investments, zoning, and ecosystem-based strategies” are all necessary. Each city has distinct climatic, hydro-logical, and socioeconomic features, but in each city the poor are most at risk and thus will require the most investment.80
In addition to adaptation within cities, coastal protections, which include construction of sea dikes and port upgrades, along with beach nourishment and dike maintenance, are needed. The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has explained how it will be economically beneficial to “climate-proof” the infrastructure in cities.81 Either way it will be costly—up to $44 billion per year through 2050 in China, for instance. Yet much of the infrastructure in China and Mongolia, the ADB found, is not worth saving—from an economic standpoint, at least. In Japan and Korea it is economically justified to “climate-proof” most types of infrastructure. But in China it is only justified for water systems, sewers, and roads, not for housing or buildings or educational services. In countries other than Japan and Korea, the ADB notes, countries may have to adapt a “partial” adaptation strategy rather than “full adaptation”—in other words, parts of their country will simply be left to be swallowed by the sea.82 In China, on the other hand, the benefits of adaptation will outweigh the costs by a longshot: costs will be less than 10 percent of expected losses.83
Typhoons are one of the deadliest weather events in the world, with both winds strong enough to lift trees and floods that overtake homes. Alarmingly, both of those aspects of typhoons are expected to get worse with global warming. While scientists don’t necessarily predict more typhoons to form as a result of climate change, it is common knowledge that those that do form will be far worse. Warmer ocean waters drive stronger storms with faster winds. Sea level rise makes every storm surge worse, flooding areas that previously had not been flooded.
It’s not always a matter of temporary evacuation when a typhoon is slated to come; typhoons can have lasting impact on land degradation, as well. Many people may be evacuated before a storm and not have a home to which they can return afterward. This pertains particularly to river deltas, and in Asia there are many.84
Typhoons will have an increasingly great impact on the river deltas of Asia. Indeed, the IPCC points to countries in South, Southeast, and East Asia as being particularly vulnerable to sea level rise in general, adding that these countries are therefore more vulnerable to typhoons. In Asia more people and economic assets are at risk of sea level rise than any other continent. By 2050, 350 million people will be exposed to one-in-one-hundred-year coastal floods.85 In Asia this has largely to do with urbanization and socioeconomic trends: the population keeps growing, and everyone keeps moving to cities on the sea coasts. With such rapid urbanization, cities and governments often don’t have time or capacity to accommodate everyone, thus the emergence and expansion of slums. These slums are even more vulnerable to the impacts of extreme weather and sea level rise.
Here is how many people in Asia typhoons displaced in 2014 alone: in China, 1.17 million people; in Japan, 570,000 people; and in the Philippines, 4.81 million people. This was the result of two typhoons: Typhoon Rammasun and Typhoon Hagupit.86 These two typhoons prompted evacuations in the Philippines that ultimately ended up the greatest displacement event in world history. This is partially because the Philippines is more vulnerable to typhoons, less capable of dealing with their impacts, than other countries—even though its population is not growing as quickly as those of wealthier countries that are more resilient to typhoons.
Therein lies the problem: lower-income countries are more vulnerable, and exposure to typhoons will only increase, particularly in Asia.87 These countries do not have the effective early warning systems and disaster response policies in place that many high-income countries do. And indeed, the Philippines is continually battered by impacts of climate change, despite being among the countries that contribute the least to it. One year before, in 2013, Typhoon Haiyan rampaged through the country with deadly and devastating effects. It was one of the strongest storms to hit land ever recorded, with wind speeds nearing 200 miles per hour and gusts up to 235 mph. It is estimated that 6,300 people were killed and 4.1 million people were displaced.88 It was the largest displacement event of the year, displacing one million more people than those forced to flee their homes in Africa, the Americas, Europe, and Oceania combined.89
After the storm, the Philippines’ lead negotiator Naderev “Yeb” Sano made a tearful appeal at the UN climate summit for international aid to adapt and protect his country from the impacts of climate change.90 He announced he was fasting “in solidarity with my countrymen who are now struggling for food back home” until there were “concrete pledges” to the Green Climate Fund, which helps developing countries cope with climate change and reduce their own emissions.91
The Philippines is the thirteenth most vulnerable country to the effects of climate change, despite contributing far less greenhouse gas emissions than the United States or Australia.92 And the country barely pulled itself together before being battered by typhoons the following year.
The United Nations noted that of the 4.1 million people originally displaced by Typhoon Haiyan, most either made it home or were resettled, but in truth 20,000 people were still displaced one year later.93 Still, over the year, the impact of the money raised to aid the millions of survivors was invaluable. The United Nations brought relief, including blankets, tents, hygiene kits, solar lanterns, and kitchen sets, to more than 700,000 of the most vulnerable survivors.
Of those still displaced, the UN noted that land and property issues stood in the way of finding a permanent home. Some people were told they would have to stay in temporary shelters for at least two years as the government searched for permanent relocation.94 Indeed, the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre noted that lack of access to land is one of the most frequently cited obstacles to solutions. Without access to land—being either unable to return to their own homes or unable to be resettled—those displaced after a disaster may become “informal settlers” who move into urban slum areas. As International Organization for Migration Philippines program director Conrad Navidad said, those settlers “would likely tell you ‘we are victims of typhoons or natural disasters, and we couldn’t wait for solutions from the government.’”95
The UN also highlighted “the urgent need for the Philippines to adopt legislation to protect the rights of internally displaced people—in what is one of the world’s most natural disaster-prone countries.”96 It will be necessary to do so before many citizens can return home or relocate somewhere new.
The fact that such legislation is not yet in place is just one cause for concern. The Brookings Institution highlighted other issues with the relocation process after Typhoon Haiyan in a case study. It found that one and a half years after the typhoon, less than 18 percent of the population felt life had returned to “normal.” Only 32 percent of households were able to meet their basic needs (that figure was 83 percent before the typhoon).97
Improving the response system to typhoons such as Haiyan will take work at all levels, from foreign institutions and NGOs to local councils. Institutions need to coordinate better with on-the-ground efforts, and localities need to improve their capacity to respond to such events. The Brookings report made the following recommendations to the Philippine government and international supporters:
1. Recognize durable solutions to displacement as a multisectoral concern, including both humanitarian and development inputs, and extending beyond the housing sector.
2. Redouble investment in the strengthening of evacuation centers, safer construction techniques and other disaster risk reduction programs.
3. Establish an interactive, rights-based monitoring system for relocation plans, policies and projects, linking local and national levels.
4. Develop and implement enhanced, culturally sensitive livelihood strategies for the affected areas, based on IDPs’ [internally displaced persons] active participation.98
Such plans as detailed by the Brookings Institution and the United Nations require a significant amount of aid. It took a massive amount of aid and efforts to serve the needs of those displaced by Typhoon Haiyan. The United Nations released $25 million in emergency funds immediately and appealed for $300 million more.99 Yet international money flooding in after the fact is not always helpful, as explained by Brookings; preparation is key. A country can only do so much with the limited finances and government response mechanisms they have. Thus, the reason for Yeb Sano’s tearful appeal.
An excerpt from his speech follows:
The picture in the aftermath is ever so slowly coming into clearer focus. The devastation is colossal. And as if this is not enough, another storm is brewing again in the warm waters of the western Pacific. I shudder at the thought of another typhoon hitting the same places where people have not yet even managed to begin standing up.
What my country is going through as a result of this extreme climate event is madness. The climate crisis is madness.
We can stop this madness.100
It can take years to recover from a cyclone. In Bangladesh the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre found that many people were still displaced by the impacts of Cyclone Aila six years after the event.101 It hit the country in 2009, inundating villages and displacing 842,000 people. Around 200,000 people were still displaced after six months, as the recovery systems and agencies did not have the capacity to handle so many displaced. Those who were displaced lived in makeshift shelters near the coasts, “surrounded by unruly water at high tide and at low tide by thousands of hectares of muddy land.”102 In the following years, additional environmental disasters displaced more than 4.7 million more Bangladeshis.
Many of those who were hit by Cyclone Aila in 2009 were still left without a permanent solution years later. Those who tried to go back to their homes found the land degraded beyond repair. Their lifestyles are constantly disrupted by repeated coastal flooding and storms. Yet without aid the process of relocating is simply unaffordable for most who live in Bangladesh and other poor Asian communities. The move is estimated to cost around $1,000 per household, according to the IOM, while the average annual income in Bangladesh is just $1,190.103
Typhoons are but one climate threat that Asian countries face, but arguably the most devastating. They bring immediate destruction that puts the plight of Asian people into the national media spotlight. And as Yeb Sano has tearfully exemplified, they may be used to make the prescient case that Asian countries need help preparing for and adapting to climate change if they want to avoid the death and displacement of events past.
It is clear to those living in Asia that climate change is a very real threat that will harm them personally, if it has not already. A Pew Research Center poll found that climate change is considered the top threat in many Asian countries, including India, China, Indonesia, the Philippines, and others.104 According to a YouGov survey released in June 2015, people from China favor action on climate change more than every other country in the world. Only 2 percent of Malaysians, 3 percent of Indonesians, and 4 percent of Chinese consider climate change “not a very serious problem” or “not a serious problem at all.” Even in Thailand, the most skeptical country, only 6 percent consider climate change not a serious problem.105
These countries wanted their country to “play a leadership role” at the United Nations climate conference in December 2015, according to the survey, urging them to set “ambitious targets to address climate change as quickly as possible.”106
It appears that Bangladesh’s climate change plight, at the least, has not gone unnoticed. Bangladesh is one of the targets for a White House climate readiness initiative announced in 2015, along with Colombia and Ethiopia. The public-private partnership will provide $34 million to these countries to help them prepare for climate change from the US government, the American Red Cross, Asian Development Bank, Esri, Google, Inter-American Development Bank, the Skoll Global Threats Fund, and the UK government.107
The program will include “scalable, replicable, comprehensive, and integrative climate services” in Bangladesh, which was chosen to represent the entire subregion of South Asia and Southeast Asia108. With its combination of sea level rise, floods, and droughts, Bangladesh indeed seems a good representative candidate for the rest of Asia. The Bangladesh program will focus on “collaboration between the partners and local stakeholders to ensure long-term ownership and sustainability of the partnership’s impact in focus countries.”109 This sounds well and good, in contrast to how the Brookings Institution saw last-minute foreign aid play out in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan.
Time will tell how this plan—and other proposals to help Asian countries respond to climate change—actually plays out. We are at a crossroads. Will we live in a world where a huge majority of the Asian population will have to migrate, or will we act?
“‘It’s Time to Stop This Madness’—Philippines Plea at UN Climate Talks,” Climate Home, http://www.climatechangenews.com/2013/11/11/its-time-to-stop-this-madness-philippines-plea-at-un-climate-talks/
1. “Surging Seas: Sea Level Rise Analysis by Climate Central,” Climate Central, http://sealevel.climatecentral.org
2. IPCC Working Group II, “Coastal Systems and Low-Lying Areas,” Climate Change 2014 Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability, United Nations, March 2014.
3. Notre Dame Global Adaptation Index, http://index.gain.org
4. Caroline Davies, “Migrants on Boat Rescued off Indonesia Recall Horrific Scenes,” Guardian, May 15, 2015, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/15/asian-migrant-crisis-grows-as-700-more-boat-people-rescued-off-indonesia.
5. “Rohingya Refugees Face More Restrictions,” IRIN News, October 12, 2012.
6. “Bangladesh Plans to Move Rohingya Refugees to Island in the South,” Agence France-Presse, May 27, 2015.
7. Thomas Fuller and Joe Cochrane, “Rohingya Migrants from Myanmar, Shunned by Malaysia, Are Spotted Adrift in Andaman Sea,” New York Times, May 14, 2015, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/15/world/asia/burmese-rohingya-bangladeshi-migrants-andaman-sea.html.
8. Davies, “Migrants on Boat Rescued.”
9. “Thousands of Refugees Stranded on ‘floating coffins’ in Southeast Asia,” Associated Press, May 15, 2015.
10. Jonathan Kaiman and Shashank Bengali, “Indonesia, Malaysia to Take in Migrants Stranded at Sea, Reversing Stance,” Los Angeles Times, May 20, 2015, http://www.latimes.com/world/asia/la-fg-ff-indonesia-malaysia-migrants-20150520-story.html.
11. Raveena Aulakh, “Climate Change Forcing Thousands in Bangladesh into Slums of Dhaka,” Toronto Star, February 16, 2013.
12. Joe Myers, “These Are the World’s 10 Fastest Growing Megacities,” World Economic Forum, November 1, 2016, https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/11/the-10-fastest-growing-megacities-in-the-world/.
13. “Climate Migration Drives Slum Growth in Dhaka,” Cities Alliance, http://www.citiesalliance.org/node/420.
14. Ibid.
15. Tansy Hoskins, “Reliving the Rana Plaza Factory Collapse: A History of Cities in 50 Buildings, Day 22,” Guardian, April 23, 2015, https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2015/apr/23/rana-plaza-factory-collapse-history-cities-50-buildings.
16. “Bangladesh Murder Trial over Rana Plaza Factory Collapse,” BBC News, June 1, 2015.
17. Marc Bain, “Years after the Rana Plaza Tragedy, Too Many of Bangladesh’s Factories Are Still ‘Death Traps,’” Quartz, October 25, 2015, https://qz.com/530308/more-than-two-years-after-the-rana-plaza-tragedy-too-many-of-bangladeshs-factories-are-still-death-traps/.
18. George Black, “Your Clothes Were Made by a Bangladeshi Climate Refugee,” Mother Jones, July 30, 2013.
19. Sarah Davies and Alex Reilly, “FactCheck: Have More Than 1000 Asylum Seekers Died at Sea under Labor?,” Conversation, July 22, 2013.
20. Amie Hamling, “Rohingya People: The Most Persecuted Refugees in the World,” Amnesty International, October 7, 2015.
21. “Turning Back Boats ‘Has to Be on Table’ as Labor Policy, Says Bill Shorten,” Australian Broadcast Corporation, July 22, 2015.
22. Alex Lee, “The Harsh Treatment of Asylum Seekers Is One Thing Labor and the Liberals Can Agree On,” Buzzfeed, July 23, 2015.
23. “Basic Facts about Myanmar,” Myanmar Embassy, http://www.myanmar-embassy-tokyo.net/about.htm.
24. Climate Change 2007: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability, United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2007, chapter 6, box 6.3, p. 327, https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg2/ar4_wg2_full_report.pdf.
25. Union of Concerned Scientists, “Ganges-Brahmaputra Delta, Bangladesh,” http://www.climatehotmap.org/global-warming-locations/ganges-brahmaputra-delta-bangladesh.html.
26. Justin Ginetti and Chris Lavell, “The Risk of Disaster-Induced Displacement in South Asia,” Internal Displacement Monitoring Center, April 2015, 32, http://www.internal-displacement.org/assets/publications/images/2015/201504-ap-south-asia-disaster-induced-displacement-risk-en.pdf.
27. Kourtnii S. Brown, “Top 3 Ways Sea Level Rise Threatens Asia-Pacific Region,” The Asia Foundation, June 4, 2014; Climate Change 2007: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability, http://asiafoundation.org/2014/06/04/top-3-ways-sea-level-rise-threatens-asia-pacific-region/.
28. George Black, “Your Clothes Were Made by a Bangladeshi Climate Refugee,” Mother Jones, July 30, 2013, http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/07/bangladesh-garment-workers-climate-change.
29. Joydeep Gupta, “Villages Swallowed as River Erosion Accelerates in Bangladesh,” The Third Pole, May 28, 2013.
30. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC Fourth Assessment Report: Climate Change 2007, 6.4.1.2, box 6.3, https://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg2/en/ch6s6–4-1–2.html#box-6–3.
31. Brown, “Top 3 Ways.”
32. Ben Block, “Deltas Sink Worldwide, Increasing Flood Risk,” Eye on Earth (Worldwatch Institute’s online news service), http://www.worldwatch.org/node/6267.
33. E.g., Brown, “Top 3 Ways.”
34. Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre and Norwegian Refugee Council, “Global Estimates 2014: People Displaced by Disasters,” September 2014, p. 25, section 3.1, http://www.internal-displacement.org/assets/publications/2014/201409-global-estimates2.pdf.
35. Norwegian Refugee Council, “22 Million People Displaced by Disasters in 2013,” September 17, 2014, http://news.trust.org//item/20140917071049-k6xeo/.
36. Michael Westphal, Gordon Hughes, and Jörn Brömmelhörster, eds., Economics of Climate Change in East Asia (Mandaluyong City, Philippines: Asian Development Bank, 2013), p. 30, box “Key Findings,” https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/publication/30434/economics-climate-change-east-asia.pdf.
37. Ibid.
38. Kevin Brown, “Hong Kong and Singapore Warned over Global Warming,” Financial Times, November 12, 2009, http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/52b4f25e-cf2a-11de-8a4b-00144feabdc0.html?ft_site=falcon&desktop=true#axzz4XAWAX18M.
39. Westphal et al., Economics of Climate Change, p. 61.
40. Johnlee Varghese, “Japan Floods: Thousands Flee Homes as Tsunami-like Waves Hit City Near Tokyo [video],” International Business Times, September 10, 2015; “More Than 100,000 Flee Floods after Heavy Rains in Japan,” Reuters, September 10, 2015.
41. “Tropical Storm Leads to Floods in Japan,” Earth Observatory, http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/view.php?id=86584&src=eorss-nh.
42. Brown, “Top 3 Ways.”
43. “Climate Hot Map Global Warming Effects around the World,” Union of Concerned Scientists, http://www.climatehotmap.org/global-warming-locations/osaka-japan.html.
44. Alva Lim and Brendan F. D. Barrett, “Japan to Suffer Huge Climate Costs,” Our World, June 30, 2009.
45. “Tropical Storm Leads to Floods.”
46. Ram Manohar, Shrestha Mahfuz, Ahmed Suphachol, and Suphachalasai Rodel Lasco, Economics of Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions in South Asia Options and Costs, (Mandaluyong City, Philippines: Asian Development Bank, 2013).
47. Climate Change 2007: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability.
48. M. K. Papademetriou, “Rice Production in the Asia-Pacific Region: Issues and Perspectives,” Food and Agriculture Organization Corporate Document Repository, http://www.fao.org/docrep/003/x6905e/x6905e04.htm.
49. Brown, “Top 3 Ways.”
50. Toru Konishi, Climate Change on the Vietnam, Mekong Delta: Expected Inpacts and Adaptations, World Bank East Asia Infrastructure, http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/templates/rome2007initiative/FAO_WB_TCIO_CC_Meeting_May_2011/TORUKO_1.PDF.
51. Ibid.
52. Suzanne K. Redfern, Nadine Azzu, and Jessie S. Binamira, “Rice in Southeast Asia: Facing Risks and Vulnerabilities to Respond to Climate Change,” Plant Production and Protection Division, FAO, Rome, April 24, 2012.
53. “Rice and Climate Change,” International Rice Research Institute, http://irri.org/news/hot-topics/rice-and-climate-change.
54. Redfern, Azzu, and Binamira, “Rice in Southeast Asia.”
55. Christina Larson, “China’s Vanishing Coastal Wetlands Are Nearing Critical Red Line,” American Association for the Advancement of Science, October 23, 2015.
56. “Wetland Conservation and Restoration,” World Wildlife Fund China, http://en.wwfchina.org/en/what_we_do/freshwater/wetland_conservation.
57. Ibid.
58. Westphal et al. Economics of Climate Change.
59. Ibid., p. 60, box “Key Messages.”
60. Casey Chumrau, “Crop Shifts in China Could Influence World Wheat Market, Southwest Farm Press, October 5, 2012, http://www.southwestfarmpress.com/grains/crop-shifts-china-could-influence-world-wheat-market.
61. Boris Cambreleng, “Drought Rattles Farmers in Eastern China,” Phys.org, February 25, 2011; “China Drought Threatens Wheat Crops,” BBC News, February 17, 2011.
62. Maria Gallucci, “India Drought 2015: Climate Change Is Biggest Threat to India’s Economy, Modi Finance Aide Says,” International Business Times, November 2, 2015.
63. Baba Umar, “India’s Shocking Farmer Suicide Epidemic,” Al Jazeera, May 18, 2015, http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2015/05/india-shocking-farmer-suicide-epidemic-150513121717412.html.
64. Zigor Aldama and Miguel Candela, “India’s Deadliest Epidemic,” Diplomat, October 20, 2015.
65. Vandana Shiva, “Seeds of Suicide and Slavery versus Seeds of Life and Freedom,” Al Jazeera, March 30, 2013.
66. “Rice and Climate Change,” “Water Scarcity.”
67. Asian Development Bank, “Rice in Asia: Climate Change and Resilient Crops,” September 25, 2013, https://www.adb.org/fr/node/40902.
68. Ibid.
69. Robin McKie, “Global Warming to Hit Asia Hardest, Warns New Report on Climate Change,” Guardian, March 22, 2014.
70. R. J. Nicholls et al., “Ranking of the World’s Cities Most Exposed to Coastal Flooding Today and in the Future,” Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, December 4, 2007, https://www.oecd.org/env/cc/39721444.pdf (executive summary).
71. Tran Viet Duc, “Which Coastal Cities Are at Highest Risk of Damaging Floods? New Study Crunches the Numbers,” http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2013/08/19/coastal-cities-at-highest-risk-floods
72. Roland J. Fuchs, “Cities at Risk: Asia’s Coastal Cities in an Age of Climate Change,” Asia Pacific Issues, no. 96, July 2010, http://www.eastwestcenter.org/system/tdf/private/api096.pdf?file=1&type=node&id=32434.
73. Fuchs, “Cities at Risk,” p. 4.
74. Ibid.
75. Ibid.
76. Ibid: 4.
77. Ibid.
78. “Addressing Climate Change and Migration in Asia and the Pacific,” Asian Development Bank, 2012, p. 14, para. 59, https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/publication/29662/addressing-climate-change-migration.pdf.
79. “Climate Risks and Adaptation in Asian Coastal Megacities,” World Bank: xvi, http://siteresources.worldbank.org/EASTASIAPACIFICEXT/Resources/226300–1287600424406/coastal_megacities_fullreport.pdf.
80. Ibid.
81. Westphal, Hughes, and Brömmelhörster, Economics of Climate Change.
82. Ibid.
83. Ibid.
84. P. P. Wong et al., “Coastal systems and low-lying areas,” in Climate Change 2014: Impacts,Adaptation, and Vulnerability. Part A: Global and Sectoral Aspects, March 2014, https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg2/WGIIAR5-Chap5_FINAL.pdf.
85. Ibid.
86. “Global Estimates 2015: People Displaced by Disasters.”
87. Ibid.
88. UNHCR, “1-Year on from Typhoon Haiyan, Thousands of People Still Rebuilding Lives,” November 7, 2014, http://www.unhcr.org/uk/news/briefing/2014/11/545c9cda6/1-year-typhoon-haiyan-thousands-people-still-rebuilding-lives.html.
89. Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre and Norwegian Refugee Council, “Global Estimates 2014,” p. 8.
90. “‘It’s Time to Stop This Madness’—Philippines Plea at UN Climate Talks,” Climate Home, http://www.climatechangenews.com/2013/11/11/its-time-to-stop-this-madness-philippines-plea-at-un-climate-talks/.
91. Green Climate Fund, “What Is GCF?” https://www.greenclimate.fund/home.
92. Pia Ranada, “Philippines Drops in 2016 List of Countries Vulnerable to Climate Change, The Rappler, November 17, 2015, http://www.rappler.com/science-nature/environment/113064-philippines-2016-climate-change-vulnerability-index.
93. “1-Year on from Typhoon Haiyan.”
94. Ibid.
95. “Global Estimates 2015: People Displaced by Disasters.”
96. “1-Year on from Typhoon Haiyan.”
97. Angela Sherwood et al., “Resolving Post-Disaster Displacement: Insights from the Philippines after Typhoon Haiyan (Yolanda),” Brookings Institution, June 15, 2015, https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Resolving-PostDisaster-DisplacementInsights-from-the-Philippines-after-Typhoon-Haiyan-June-2015.pdf.
98. Ibid.
99. “Typhoon Haiyan: Aid in Numbers,” BBC News, November 14, 2013.
100. “‘It’s Time to Stop This Madness.’”
101. “Global Estimates 2015: People Displaced by Disasters.”
102. Ibid.
103. Ibid.
104. Jill Carle, “Climate Change Seen as Top Global Threat,” Pew Research Center, July 14, 2015.
105. “Global Survey: Chinese Most in Favor of Action on Climate Change,” YouGov Survey, June 4, 2015.
106. Andrew Griffin, “UK and US Main Barriers to Addressing Climate Change, Survey Finds,” Independent, June 7, 2015, http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/uk-and-us-main-barriers-to-addressing-climate-change-survey-finds-10303279.html.
107. “Fact Sheet: Launching a Public-Private Partnership to Empower Climate-Resilient Developing Nations,” White House Office of the Press Secretary, June 9, 2015, http://reliefweb.int/report/world/fact-sheet-launching-public-private-partnership-empower-climate-resilient-developing.
108. Ibid.
109. Ibid.
