Climate change, natural disasters, and international migration: A country-level analysis considering climatic zones

Abstract

Climate change and natural disasters might increase the vulnerability of populations in affected regions. This article investigates the link between climatic events and bilateral migration from countries in the Global South to OECD countries. A gravity model is estimated using panel data techniques and bearing in mind potential sources of heterogeneity across subsamples. The main novelty is to distinguish by climatic zones, while also considering commonly used social and economic stresses, such as income levels and incidence of conflict. The analysis is based on bilateral emigration flows from 76 developing countries to OECD countries in the last decades. The results show that increasing extreme temperatures and storms in arid and semi-arid zones act as triggers of bilateral migration from South to North and that the estimated effects are non-negligible. The results are robust to a battery of tests, including dividing the sample according to the levels of conflict and poverty.

Why do Croats Migrate to Austria? Motives for and Experiences of Migration since 2013

“…Some authors also point out crime, violence, discrimination and security problems as frequent push and pull factors for recent migration (Parkins 2010;Urbanski 2022), and when it comes to forced or involuntary migration, war, political revolutions and religious conflicts stand out as the most common push factors (Hager 2021). In addition to the aforementioned, other frequent factors of migration in recent decades are climate change and natural disasters (Martínez-Zarzoso et al 2022), as well as demographic changes such as overpopulation and, accordingly, a lack of jobs in developing countries and the aging of the population in developed countries that are forced to import foreign labour (Abella 2005).…”

Development and Application of a Real-Time GIS Digital Platform for Landslide Risk Analysis

“…Climate change is rapidly altering our planet, leading to an alarming increase in the occurrence and severity of various disasters [1][2][3][4]. One of the most concerning consequences is the escalating frequency and intensity of landslides, which inflict significant damage on lives and properties worldwide [5][6][7][8][9].…”