The Climate Change and Displacement Initiative is an ongoing initiative instigated in 2009 designed to find practical and viable housing, land and property solutions for climate displaced persons.
Through rights-based and innovative policy and strategy development, targeted workshops, network building, awareness raising, publications, original research and other activities, the Initiative seeks both to inform the world of the massive scale of displacement which will affect forced climate migrants in the years and decades to come, and to advocate for rights-based solutions to this form of displacement, both within the nations affected and through regional and international resettlement initiatives.
The Initiative will achieve these aims through:
Land Solutions for Climate Displacement, 2012-2013
In 2012-2013, DS will carry out a major project on land solutions for climate displacement with researchers and scholars from 7 climate-affected countries – Bangladesh, Kiribati, Maldives, PNG, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu and Vanuatu. The study will examine in detail the feasibility of land acquisition, relocation and resettlement options for communities threatened with land loss and homelessness caused by climate change.
Climate Change and Displacement Reader, January 2012
This 500 page publication brings together more than 50 articles and reports on the links between climate change and displacement and is ideal for use as a university textbook or as a central resource for anybody working on or interested in the issue of climate change and displacement. It can be purchased here.
Climate Change Displaced Persons and Housing, Land and Property Rights: Preliminary Strategies for Rights-Based Planning and Programming to Resolve Climate-Induced Displacement, December 2009
This publication is one of the first of its kind to examine the specific housing, land and property rights issues arising within the context of climate-induced displacement. It contains a series of recommendations to policy-makers and others for the prompt resolution of this particularly complex and large-scale form of displacement.
International Workshop on Land Solutions to Climate Displacement, October 2012
DS hosted an international workshop on land solutions to climate displacement in Auckland, New Zealand on 4 October 2012. The workshop brought together experts and government officials from Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu and New Zealand to discuss and examine legal and policy solutions to climate displacement in seven focus countries – Bangladesh, Kiribati, Maldives, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu and Vanuatu. Click here here to read more.
Joint statement on Climate Change, Human Rights and Forced Human Displacement, December 2008
Joint statement on Climate Change, Human Rights and Forced Human
Displacement by Co-Chairs Displacement Solutions and UNHCR on 10 December
2008, the 60th Anniversary of International Human Rights Day.
Download PDF (56KB)
Report of the Displacement Solutions and UNHCR Meeting on Climate Change, December 2008
Report of the Displacement Solutions and UNHCR Meeting on Climate Change,
Human Rights and Forced Displacement, held in Canberra, Australia on the 60th
Anniversary of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, 10 December 2008.
Download PDF (284KB)
Report of The Bougainville Resettlement Initiative, December 2008
Report of the Displacement Solutions hosted meeting entitled The Bougainville
Resettlement Initiative, held in Canberra, Australia on 11 December 2008. This unique
gathering brought together community representatives of the world’s largest mass
resettlement programme due to climate change from the Carteret Islands in Papua
New Guinea, Government officials from the island of Bougainville, private landowners
from Bourgainville, private sector investors, AusAid representatives, UN officials,
resettlement and human rights experts, various NGOs and representatives from
various other small island states threatened with rising sea levels, including Tuvalu,
Kiribati and the Maldives. The meeting developed detailed and concrete proposals to
facilitate, in a rights-based manner, the resettlement modalities of the 6000 atoll
dwellers who will relocate to Bougainville.
Download PDF (220KB)
Background paper for joint meeting on displacement and climate change co-hosted by DS and UNHCR in Canberra, Australia, 10 December 2008
Download the meeting paper (244KB)
Radio Australia Interview on Solutions to Climate Displacement in the Asia Pacific, April 2012
DS Director, Scott Leckie, spoke with Heather Jarvis on Radio Australia Asia Pacific on 18 April, 2012 about the intended use of land purchased in Vanua Levu, Fiji, by the Government of Kiribati. This interview follows significant coverage of Kiribati President Anote Tong’s plan for ‘dignifed migration’ for the i-Kiribati people in the face of rising sea levels and the many other challenges climate change has brought the island nation. In this interview he discussed a number of relocation and adaptation issues relating to climate displacement in these areas, in particular, addressing the need for investment in both domestic social services in the short to medium-term and long-term planning that may include off-shore solutions. Listen to the interview here.
Radio Australia Interview on the 2010 DS Mission to the Pacific, December 2010
On 14 December, 2010, DS Director, Scott Leckie, spoke to Radio Australia regarding his fact-finding mission in the Pacific Island of Kiribati and Tuvalu that year, and a number of relocation and adaptation issues relating to climate displacement in those countries. To listen, click here.
Media Coverage of the Displacement Solutions and UNHCR Meeting on Climate Change, December 2008
On the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights DS co-chaired a meeting with UNHCR on climate change, human rights and forced human displacement which was attended by prominent government and UN officials as well as civil society actors, including participants from the countries most vulnerable to the effects of climate change. The meeting explored not only the nature of the risk posed by climate change for human rights and forced human displacement, but also potential solutions building upon work that is already underway in several vulnerable countries.
Featured below are two media reports covering this occasion.
Displacement Solutions is in the process of establishing a Climate Change Land Solutions Fund to generate funds for the purchase of new land resources for climate displaced persons.
Deutsche Welle Article about DS’ Work on Climate Displacement, August 2011
Deutsche Welle recently published an article about Displacement Solutions and its work in finding solutions for displaced persons throughout the world. Included in this article is information about the work of DS in Bangladesh and other climate-affected countries. To access the article, click here.
DS Director Addresses Climate Displacement Event in Berlin, June 2010
DS Director Scott Leckie was invited by German Green Party MP Ute Koczy and the Heinrich Boell Stiftung to present a talk on climate displacement and land solutions for those displaced. The talk formed part of a panel discussion held on 29 June 2010 in Berlin, and focused on DS efforts in Bangladesh, Kiribati, Papua New Guinea and Tuvalu to find viable and rights-based solutions to climate displacement for all affected persons and communities. To read a full report of the meeting, click here.
Climate-Related Disasters and Displacement: Homes for Homes, Lands for Lands, June 2009
This paper was presented by DS Director Scott Leckie to the Expert-Group meeting on Population Dynamics and Climate Change, London, June 2009.
Download Word Document (92KB)
Climate Change and Human Rights Article, September 2008
An article on the human rights implications of climate change by DS Director Scott Leckie, featured in the September 2008 edition of Forced Migration Review.
Download Full (4Mb) Download Scott’s Article (460KB)