THE EFFECT OF CLIMATE CHANGE ON WEATHER RELATED DISASTERS AND MIGRATION IN ETHIOPIA

Abstract

The ongoing climate change has been the driving force behind an increase of natural hazards around the world, and climate scientists have predicted that the trend will continue to rise. Increased radiative forcing leads to global warming which in turn affects several of the climate systems on earth, with changes in weather and living conditions as a result. The rapid nature of the changes makes it difficult to adapt to the new conditions, leaving ecosystems and habitats in a vulnerable state with human populations exposed to disasters as a result. One way to adapt is migration, but migration is a complex process driven by many factors. Populations living in areas of the world that already have a strained climate are most exposed to disasters induced by climate change, and often have widespread poverty and conflicts within their borders. One of those places is Ethiopia, which is the study area of this paper. By reviewing previous research and analysing data on climate records, projections and disasters the aim of this study is to find what hazards are the largest threat to the people living in Ethiopia, how climate models project future progress of those hazards, which regions are the most vulnerable, and how they are going to affect migration. The results are that drought is the largest threat to people in Ethiopia and that all parts of the country are predicted to get hotter and most of them drier. Lowland regions are at lowest risk of climate disaster, and the Ethiopian highlands are going to face large changes in the quantity of land areas with agricultural potential. This can be expected to lead to losses in food availability and resources for the whole nation, but since the nature of this kind of slow-onset disasters limits the possibilities to migrate the overall displacement in the country is not assessed to alter significantly.