Monday, February 15, 2016

Migrants? Wait Till They're Your Neighbours.

The exodus of Syrian refugees has us thinking of migrants as strangers from distant lands with foreign cultures and languages. We don't think of migrants as our fellow countrymen. That's going to change.

It was the UN that coined the term "IDP" or internally displaced population. We are about to get a whole lot of IDP. It's not a matter of if but when and how many.



A report published in Nature Climate Change reveals what percentage of each nation's population currently lives in areas that will be inundated by sea level rise. Canada is in the 5-10% category meaning we could have between 2 and 4-million Canadians to relocate.

The United States is in the 10-25% category which means a population equivalent to one or two Canadas. Remember that's from sea level rise alone. America has other climate crises, especially fresh water depletion, that are expected to drive many millions more out of the southern states. Europe, India and China are in the same category. With three billion among them, that's an enormous level of displacement.

Pity poor Australia. They're in the next bracket up, 25-50% displacement. Most of Southeast Asia is in the same boat along with Japan and most of Ireland.

Worst off are Egypt and Libya where the populations are very coastal. They're predicted to experience 50 to 75% migration.


3 comments:

e.a.f. said...

The Americans may be arriving as refugees prior to any climate change impacts hit their country. if Trump and some of his ilk are elected and deliver on their promises we can expect several million Americans to arrive in Canada as political refugees.

Anonymous said...

Perhaps we should encourage Trump to build a wall between Canada and the US. The US seems to be so concerned about the number of Refugees we are bringing into Canada. Water..? Well....there is supposed to be an ocean full of water in the middle of the earth.

Steve said...

in the future Canada will not only be the worlds lifeboat, but its speedboat into the future. We need exchange controls and negative interest rate gov bonds now.