Osnovna škola Bartola Kašića Vinkovci Erasmus+ project 2018-2020 Stop Climate Change – Together Europe Achieves More CLIMATE REFUGEES October 2018

Climate refugees are people who are forced to leave their homes and regions because of changes to their local environment. Lots of terms are used: - environmental migrants - forced environmenal migrants - climate change refugees - eco-refugees - disaster refugees

There are 3 types of environmental migration: Emergency migrants: people who are forced to leave homes temporarily because of some disaster (flood, hurricane, tsunami, land slide...) Such events happen even in most developed countries. Thousands of people were forced to leave homes when hurricane Katrina struck the coast of the USA in 2005 and destroyed whole New Orleans. They leave homes temporarily.

- Environmental forced migrants: people who must leave homes because environmental conditions have been getting worse (long periods of droughts that cause famine, rising sea level, deforestation,...) There are tens of millions of migrants in the world, continents most severely affected are Africa and Asia.

- Environmental motivated migrants / environmentally induced economic migrants: people who leave homes in order to avoid possible future problems and to find better life for themselves and their families.

Number of climate refugees is constantly and rapidly growing: it is estimated that 26 million people are forced to leave their homes every year. They either move to other places within their countries or go to other countries. Experts predict that there might be at least 200 million refugees by 2050, but the worst predictions go up to 1 billion environmental refugees.

United Nations have the agency that tries to help refugees United Nations have the agency that tries to help refugees. They need - protection (safety) - food - health care - local integration - education - homes - jobs

People forced to leave homes need help, but most countries are not prepared for dealing with large numbers of refugees and treat the situation differently: - some countries accept large numbers of refugees daily, help them to integrate and allow them to stay permanently - some countries do not accept any refugees and build fences and walls, not only in Europe: India has border fences to prevent refugees from Pakistan and Bangladesh to enter the country - it is also possible to try to prevent climate changes, e.g. growing deserts

The Great Green Wall for the Sahara and Sahel is an African Union programme bringing togehter more than 20 countries. It is a plan to plant trees across Africa and build a “green wall” 8000 km long, across the entire width of Africa. Its aim is to stop advancement of the Sahara Desert . The desert causes drought, famine, conflicts and migration of millions of people. The initiative started on 2007, life is coming back to some regions, bringing food security and jobs. The completed wall will be the largest living structure on our planet.

If global warming does not stop, experts say that Slavonia will become a desert very soon, in few decades. Agriculture will be impossible. Will we become climate refugees, too?

Let’s adopt a motto “Think globally, act locally” Let’s adopt a motto “Think globally, act locally”. We must do our best to help people who already have problems and make their lives easier. We also must do everything we can to stop climate changes in order to make the Earth habitable for future generations, too.