Saleemul Huq

The developed countries of the world had agreed under the Paris Agreement to provide USD 100 billion each year, starting from 2020 onwards, to support mitigation as well as adaptation projects in developing countries.

Under the Paris Agreement of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), rich countries have promised to provide, collectively, USD 100 billion every year to support the developing countries tackle climate change, both by mitigation and adaptation.

Earlier this month, during the London Climate Action week, my organisation, the International Centre for Climate Change and Development, together with the UK’s Royal Geographical Society (RGS) and the Bangladesh High Commission in London, organised a major event with several hundred Londoners, including many British Bangladeshis, themed “Learning lessons from Bangladesh”.

This year marks a clear break with the past in terms of the climate change problem now becoming a “climate change crisis” with the adverse impacts of human-induced climate change getting visible across the world.

Last May, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was invited to the annual leaders’ high-level meeting in Munich, Germany, to speak on the growing concern about the global security threats due to climate change.

People migrating from one place to another—whether within the same country or across international borders—is a complex phenomenon, in which pull factors (such as job-seeking) and/or push factors (such as environmental degradation) can play important roles. Recently, the impacts of climate change have been included in this hypothesis, as a major environmental push factor, which has drawn a great deal of interest from political as well as scientific circles.

2019 is proving to be a game-changing year with regard to the issue of global climate change in a number of ways.

The Least Developed Countries (LDC) group constitutes 47 countries, mostly in Africa and some in Asia (including Bangladesh), officially recognised by the United Nations (UN). Countries belonging to the group are entitled to duty-free access to developed country markets for their goods and are recognised under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) as the most vulnerable countries to climate change. At the same time, they are also eligible to receive Official Development Assistance (ODA) from developed countries bilaterally as grants.

Last week the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR) meeting was held in Geneva, Switzerland with more than 4,000 delegates from all over the world and many different stakeholders including government, UN agencies, private sector, civil society, women’s groups, indigenous peoples’ groups, youth groups, groups related to people with disabilities, and many others.

The group of Least Developed Countries (LDC) has been negotiating under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) for many years and has continuously taken leadership roles at key points. For example, the push for and successful inclusion (against great odds) of the long-term global temperature goal of 1.5 degrees Centigrade in the Paris Agreement in 2015.

The recent devastation in Mozambique due to two successive hurricanes (Aida and Kenneth) of unprecedented severity for southern Africa, are a clear indicator that we are now living in a climate changed world. And that the huge loss and damage sustained by the people of Mozambique is due to human-induced climate change and not just natural causes.

It has now been well over five years since the Green Climate Fund (GCF) was set up with its headquarters in Songdo, Korea to support both mitigation and adaptation projects and programmes in developing countries. It received an initial contribution of around USD 10 billion and is now undergoing a review of its performance in anticipation of a major replenishment of funds from 2020 onwards.

A recent report from Unicef mentions that 19 million (or one in three) children in Bangladesh are at risk from the effects of climate change.

The massive cyclone Idai that devastated Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe last week has destroyed 90 percent of Beira, the second biggest city in Mozambique.

Over the last two decades or more, the global scientific community has been raising the alarm about climate change, through the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) which were then considered by the governments of the world at the annual Conference of Parties (COP) under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

At the global level there has been a recent set of decisions in the different fora dealing with refugees, migrants and climate change to bring the three issues together and plan better so that we can avoid potential future crisis.

The topic of loss and damage from human-induced climate change has been a highly politically sensitive issue in international negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) for many years with vulnerable developing countries, including Bangladesh, arguing in its favour and the rich countries arguing against it.

Over the last two decades, the issue of global climate change has shifted from being primarily an environmental issue to a global security and diplomatic issue as well. Hence many countries have shifted responsibility from the ministry of environment to the foreign ministry as the focal ministry to handle the issue.

It is now well over a year since nearly 700,000 Rohingyas were forced out of Myanmar and Bangladesh opened its borders to them and gave them shelter in the Cox's Bazar region.

In the last week of January, the United Nations Security Council in New York held a special session on climate change as a global security threat.