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Faced With Rising Temperatures, People May Seek Asylum (axios.com) 210

Europe is already struggling to absorb an influx of refugees from war-torn Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Africa. Germany alone has taken in more than a million people since 2015. This wave of immigration has led to political upheaval, with the rise of right-wing political parties in Germany, Poland, Austria, and Hungary, among others. Now a new study, published in the journal Science, shows that the current surge in refugees may just be a preview of what's to come due in large part to global warming. From a report: At an average growing season temperature of about 68 Fahrenheit, which is the optimum one for agriculture, the number of applications for asylum was lowest. As the average temperature rose, so did the number of people from Somalia, Bangladesh and other warmer climate countries seeking asylum. But when cooler countries -- such as Serbia and Peru -- got warmer, fewer applications were received. The acceptance rate for asylum application to the EU is less than 10%. But when there was a spike in applications tied to weather fluctuations, the admittance rate rose to about 30%, suggesting agencies who evaluate the applicants find their cause worthy.
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Faced With Rising Temperatures, People May Seek Asylum

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  • by XXongo ( 3986865 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @11:04AM (#55789617) Homepage
    Would be useful if this were given some numerical context. How do the numbers of refugees due to climate compare to the numbers of refugees due to war and due to oppressive governments?
    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      The lack of numerical data is intentional. This is low effort propaganda designed to tug at your feels by throwing a bunch of half ass speculation in your face, juxtapositioned with stock photos of starving children.

      • by Anonymous Coward

        Exactly this. The numbers here are easy 0 refugees due to climate change the remaining due to the factors GP cited. This is just a cheap propaganda attempt

      • by meglon ( 1001833 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @04:31PM (#55792221)
        http://archive.defense.gov/pub... [defense.gov]

        You living in your own private fantasy land doesn't mean jack shit to reality.
      • Lack of numbers is intentional in that it hasn't happened yet and this entire premise is philosophical and not getting dragged into the exact science debate.

        But your instant dismissal of something like an area being made unlivable causing mass migration (which is a prediction of most climate models for many places on the world) as propaganda has been noted. Don't worry, as your leader has said the entire climate change thing was just invented by Jhina.

    • by Hal_Porter ( 817932 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @11:24AM (#55789777)

      That would require someone do a multivariate analysis. And they won't do that because it would show civil war, oppressive governments etc are more strongly correlated to refugee flows than climate.

      Actually one big driver was getting rid of people like Gaddafi who stopped migrants coming to Europe. The EU had a deal with Gaddafi. Then France and the UK toppled him and Libya became essentially a failed state.

      https://www.theguardian.com/co... [theguardian.com]

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

      Turkey also uses refugee flows as a foreign policy tool - they turn on the tap when they want more money from Europe.

      https://www.euractiv.com/secti... [euractiv.com]

      So how much is climate a cause? Not much. Weather probably does have some impact though - mainly because if you're going to cross the Med or walk across Europe you'd be better off doing when it's not freezing cold. But weather and climate are not the same thing.

    • by hey! ( 33014 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @11:53AM (#55790017) Homepage Journal

      Actually this is a good point, but you're presupposing that these two causes of refugee flight are mutually exclusive. In fact they work synergistically. Environmental stress creates economic disruption, creating political unrest, encouraging people predisposed to fight oppressive governments rebel. That in turn prompting oppressive responses which exacerbate the underlying crisis and further erode the regime's credibility. This takes resources and focus away from the response to the underlying disaster, and in any case the inevitable favoritism and corruption push the regime to the brink of collapse.

      Take Syria, a perfect storm scenario. It's had a horrifically brutal, but *stable* regime for decades. A multi-year drought depopulated the countryside, further reducing its own agricultural output and creating large urban concentrations of unemployed young men ripe for radicalization. Then a transient spike in global wheat prices created shortages of subsidized bread and huge price spikes in market prices. This was

      It's hard to say how much better an honest and generally popular Syrian government would have weathered the crisis, but this much is clear: while oppressive governments *can* produce refugees on their own, they don't necessarily do so. But put a country where people hate and fear their government under stress, and you'll get refugees.

    • Would be useful if this were given some numerical context. How do the numbers of refugees due to climate compare to the numbers of refugees due to war and due to oppressive governments?

      Probably not that easy as things are interrelated. Climate change causes drought. Drought causes poor food yield. Poor harvests cause higher prices and starvation. High food prices and starvation cause civil unrest. Civil unrest cause refugees.

    • Is it just me (living in a very cold climate) or does anecdotal evidence still suggest people are flocking to these warm areas of our planet over the vast frozen landscapes that dominate most of our land mass?

      I sure as hell aren't seeing people flock to our winter. And let's be real - the cold here will kill someone far faster than any of these warm spots. The grasping at straws of the climate craze movement to convince we have a coming disaster (and need to hand over all our money to fix it) is gettin
  • Suspicious reasoning (Score:5, Interesting)

    by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @11:07AM (#55789629)

    Is it really climate that drives people from Somalia or Bangladesh? Or is it instead the fact those countries are pretty unstable and people want to get to a more stable area?

    Especially if you are talking refugees, and not simply immigration requests. "Refugee" implies something catastrophic they are fleeing, not slightly warmer weather.

    • Re: (Score:1, Flamebait)

      not slightly warmer weather.

      There's your problem: lack of imagination. They're not running away from slightly warmer weather, they're running away from the secondary effects of that warmer weather: Too much rain/not enough rain, crop losses due to higher temps, etc.

      You really need to broaden your horizons dude. Or maybe learn how to use Google.
      • by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @11:32AM (#55789847)

        They're not running away from slightly warmer weather, they're running away from the secondary effects of that warmer weather: Too much rain/not enough rain, crop losses due to higher temps

        The truth is those factors alone are not enough to convince most people to move. Several years of bad crops and California farmers are still farming.

        You aren't suffering from a lack of imagination, just a lack of understanding the overall conditions of the regions people are leaving. "Poor crop yield" is so far down the list it doesn't even register, and makes very little sense for some of the areas talked about (like Bangladesh).

        In fact, it turns out that Bangladesh crop yields are going up [bdnews24.com], if you look at potatoes the output is up - in fact the real problem with crops this past year was not warmer weather, but flooding. Even so total agricultural production was up 2.9% overall, so why would people be refugees from Bangladesh based on crop yields when they are up?

        • by Anonymous Coward

          From your link, the headline:
          "Bangladesh’s food production [i.e. in total] dropped by 943,000 tonnes in fiscal 2016-17"

          "past year was not warmer weather, but flooding"
          Yeh right, flooding, the predicted affect of global warming, so what's your point?

          " so why would people be refugees from Bangladesh based on crop yields when they are up"
          Because they're hungry, and your attempt to mislead people here by lying doesn't fill their stomachs. I mean really SuperKendall, were you hoping nobody would google the

        • To put immigration on climate change is a far stretch, the relationship is more of a butterfly effect. To completely ignore climate change as a factor would be a mistake. Climate change can drive significant agricultural changes. Significant change to crop yield, be it negative or lateral disrupts a lot of families and individuals. By lateral crop yield change, I mean the change from one crop to another. Ex: A farmer, who has invested to grow wheat, may fail and his farmland may be acquired by a com
        • Flooding because of warmer climate?
          Or simple flooding as Bangladesh is experiencing floods quite regularily?
          Looking at potatoes does not really make sense in Bangladesh either ... why don't you look on a map where it is, then you easily should be able to guess their main staple food.

      • Not to mention that lack of rain/crops can lead to increased poverty which can lead to increased violence. People might be fleeing from the violence, but the root cause might be crop loss due to global warming.

    • hopefully the situations in those countries improves and they can all go home.

    • I'm pretty sure Bangladesh is partly unstable for climate reasons. That's what you get for living in a low-elevation place in a watery region that isn't the Netherlands.
      • by PPH ( 736903 )

        Why don't they just move inland a few miles with a few more feet of elevation above seal level? Answer: Because their neighbors who already live there will kill them.

        Sorry you folks live in a shithole where your fellow citizens won't step up and help you. Explain to me why this is my problem again?

    • by Anonymous Coward

      Check the box on the application form: Reason for requesting asylum.

      Hey look! Someone added 'Global Warming'. Let's check that.

    • by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 22, 2017 @11:21AM (#55789753)

      It's absurd to call them "refugees".

      Real refugees have 2 primary goals:

      1) To reach the nearest location where the immediate danger they face is no longer present.

      2) To return to their origin as soon as it is safe to do so.

      In the case of Syrians, the locations matching those criteria would typically be within Syria itself. They could find safety without ever leaving the country.

      In rare situations, some Syrians might find Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, or even Iraq to be closer. But that's as far as they'd ever need to go to reach safety, while still being able to return home as soon as possible.

      There's absolutely no legitimate reason for any Syrian to have made the long journey to a Europe nation like Greece, never mind distant European nations like Germany, Sweden or the UK.

      The same goes for anyone coming from Africa. At least Syrians can say there is something resembling a real war going on in their nation. That's not true for nearly all of the Africans. They conditions might not be good, but they're nothing like Syria.

      It's even worse when it comes to those from Afghanistan, given how far away Afghanistan is from Europe.

      Anyone traveling thousands upon thousands of miles to Europe, through numerous safe countries, and with no intent to ever leave Europe, is not a "refugee". They're illegal aliens, and that's exactly what they should be referred to as. They should also be immediately deported.

      • No place to go (Score:4, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 22, 2017 @11:37AM (#55789881)

        Real refugees have 2 primary goals 1) To reach the nearest location where the immediate danger they face is no longer present. 2) To return to their origin as soon as it is safe to do so.

        In the case of Syrians, the locations matching those criteria would typically be within Syria itself. They could find safety without ever leaving the country.

        I take it you know nothing about the Syrian crisis, then.

        What place in Syria is it that you believe is "where the immediate danger they face is no longer present"? The few places within Syria that aren't in a war zone with boundaries that are constantly changing... are jammed to overflowing with the eight million people who are already displaced within Syria; the largest internally displaced population in the world. About six in ten Syrians [pewresearch.org] are now refugees, most of them internally.

        http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-34189117

      • In rare situations, some Syrians might find Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, or even Iraq to be closer.

        Funny that you don't mention Israel in that list of neighbors. The one country that's done the most to destabilize Syria is also the one that's done nothing to help.

      • by CohibaVancouver ( 864662 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @12:46PM (#55790433)

        2) To return to their origin as soon as it is safe to do so.

        My next-door-neighbours arrived here in Canada as refugees from Vietnam in the 70s. They got jobs, became citizens, and raised children. 40 years later, Vietnam is now 'safe' but they have no interest in returning there. They're Canadians now. The mother of the household vacations there every few years to visit friends and family, but that's it.

        The Syrian refugees across the street from me will likely follow the same pattern - They are integrating themselves into our community. If, a decade from now, Syria is 'safe,' the pull to go back there will likely be weak.

      • Your point two is plain wrong and one arguable as well.
        And the guys who modded you up are idiots.

        If YOU would flee from your own country, would marry have kids, learn the language and have a satisfying job: why the funk would you want to go "home"?

        You have a new home then ... where ever you are.

      • by Kjella ( 173770 )

        Real refugees have 2 primary goals:
        1) To reach the nearest location where the immediate danger they face is no longer present.
        2) To return to their origin as soon as it is safe to do so.

        So what you're saying is that everybody's primary goal is to stay at their origin, only refugees leave and only because they're forced away and only for as long as absolutely necessary? I think quite a lot of people who has left their home town or state or emigrated would disagree with that. I'll admit that I've ended up fairly close to home, but it's because of family, friends and familiar surroundings. If I didn't have anyone left behind because they've either with me, fled somewhere else or they're dead

      • 2) To return to their origin as soon as it is safe to do so.

        This has never nor will ever be the definition of a requirement for a refugee.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      When it gets too hot to grow food, and people start starving, it leads to the kind of political instability that creates refugees. Just FYI.

    • Cause and effect (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Comboman ( 895500 )

      Is it really climate that drives people from Somalia or Bangladesh? Or is it instead the fact those countries are pretty unstable and people want to get to a more stable area?

      Yes, but those countries are relatively more stable when climate (and thus food production) are closer to historical norms. Instability drives migration, but food shortages drive instability and climate drives food shortages.

  • by Kenja ( 541830 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @11:13AM (#55789665)
    Floors be COLD in the morning yall...
  • For Europe the enemy is already inside the gates.

  • According to https://www.immigrationequalit... [immigrationequality.org]

    An asylum seeker must prove that he or she has a well-founded fear of persecution based on one or more of five grounds:

    Race
    Religion
    Nationality
    Membership in a particular social group (Most LGBTQ individuals who apply for asylum qualify under this category)
    Political opinion

  • by Anonymous Coward

    Faced with rejection of "refugees" from non-war-torn areas, we'll make importation of the new underclass more palatable by whining about, "But, but, it's warm where they're from!"

  • 68 Fahrenheit = 20 Celsius

    I know. "Just fucking Google it."

    But by omitting that bit of information in the summary, something that would require msmash five seconds of work, you just made every non-US reader waste five second.

    So you saved five seconds but caused a total waste of who-the-fuck-knows how many hours for everyone else not in the USA.

    • Well, while you are right, you can safely assume everyone in the world knows that 100F is body temperature ... so 68F is significantly below that.
      Who cares if that is 19, 20 or 21 C

  • by IWantMoreSpamPlease ( 571972 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @11:45AM (#55789943) Homepage Journal

    >>...with the rise of right-wing political parties...
    This is curious to me. Are these parties rising because they see their country and identity being overrun with immigrants, or are they on the rise because they see their country becoming a (perceived, rightly or wrongly) welfare state for foreigners, or is it something else?

    The implication from the summary is it's due to climate shift, but I'm not so certain that's accurate.

    • As with everything in life, there are probably multiple reasons. Included in there is likely people doing worse off (or perceiving that they are worse off) and laying blame with a group of "others" just as they've done for thousands of years.

      • The thing about merely perceiving to be less well off, I can't recall seeing any populist (not all the parties are actually right wing) argumentation based on that and I live in Europe myself.

        No, the usual arguments are about the additional strain on healthcare and social services, increased crime (specially rapes and other violent crime where immigrants from Africa and the middle East are already badly overrepresented), the cost of the unemployment and other benefits along with the rather retrograde vie
      • by Mashiki ( 184564 )

        Look at the systemic lack of action by police, councils and the crown in the UK over the massive child prostitution, child grooming and rape gangs, and it becomes a case that it's a bit from column a and b. More so that the prevailing political thought is "not to punish those asians" but to ignore it, or even accost the victims. And you've seen the same happening in other EU countries with regards to similar issues, or issues stemming from that. Again with the government, courts, police, crowns offices,

  • by DontBeAMoran ( 4843879 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @11:57AM (#55790045)

    Come to Canada, we'll give you our snow! Just take it off our streets and it's yours!

  • it's because refugees aren't immigrants. They didn't move for a better life, they moved because they got kicked out. So they don't integrate with the host society. This is a big problem in Europe right now. It's giving their far right ammunition. It's also put the Jews in a bind as they're sandwiched between a far right that hates them and Muslim refugees that aren't exactly crazy about them either. Meanwhile demagogues are using all this social friction to rise to power.
    • They weren't 'kicked out' of their homelands. They left voluntarily.

      They are looking for the best government handouts, which is why they go to Germany, Sweden, France and the UK, rather than the closer European nations in the Balkans that aren't as generous with handouts.

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      So they don't integrate with the host society.

      If course they do. Canada is full of refugees, all very happy to be here, and the majority of whom are working hard to integrate into Canadian society.

      My next door neighbours are refugees. The whole family works freaking hard and all manner of scut jobs.

    • by The Cynical Critic ( 1294574 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @02:14PM (#55790997)
      Ummm... The only problem with this is that now that countries have had the time to process most of the mass that arrived in Europe during 2015, it's become clear that actual refugees only make up a minority of those masses. Massive amounts of people saw an opportunity for a better life in Europe and simply hitched a ride with the actual refugees. Even Sweden, having a reputation of being very welcoming to immigrants, has been rejecting about 70% of all asylum applications and the deportation of immigrants who have finally exhausted all of their options is becoming a bigger and bigger problem across Europe.

      Not only is it becoming harder and harder to get the countries to take back all of their citizens, Iraq being particularly difficult, a lot of the immigrants have decided to simply not accept that their asylum application got denied. Instead they've either gone underground, thinking if they stay long enough they can eventually get permanent residence, or have started roving around Europe applying for asylum in multiple countries using false identities (as per the Dublin process if you have your asylum application denied in one country other EU countries will not even consider any further applications by you).
  • This isn't really news. Climate refugees will outnumber other refugees (war, economical, social) within two to four decades. This has been suspected for 2,5 decades and since was proven to be a correct assumption.
    Scientists also pretty much agree that certain parts of earth will be inhabitable at the end of this century. Central india and large areas in africa are on that list. Global heat wave death rates are rising by the year and this will only get worse.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      Please feel free to point to a single refugee application in any country in the world where someone put down "I want to leave my country and come to yours because the weather in my country sucks!"...claiming you know that people are leaving an area due to 'climate change' is entire bullshit. Until or unless you can separate refugees leaving for entirely other man made reasons (war, dictatorships or other government control making life shitty) you have no way to claim any single person is leaving their count

  • by mveloso ( 325617 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @01:15PM (#55790607)

    Let's blame everything on climate change, because why not?

    • Let's blame everything on climate change, because why not?

      Oh? I'm interested. Do you postulate that people in an area that are no longer able to sustain food or water would instead stay in that area?

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Ever notice how they're leaving all muslim countries that are by all accounts pretty shitty because they're sharia'd lawed up and then they pass through moderately wealthy Muslim places like Turkey, UAE, Saudi Arabia and still go to Europe?

    It's because they're looking for handouts from the overly generous European welfare programs and don't want to work.

    I don't blame them. If Europe is that stupid to give out free money without any plan to get you on your feet that's their own fault.

    • I wouldn't give handouts to men who abandoned their wives and daughters and sisters just to save their own skin. fuck them.

  • Unfortunately media hasn't entirely caught on to this yet but a lot of refugees flooding into Europe are actually from Africa and it isn't because of war. This has unfortunately been going on for more years than when things blew up in Syria. Basically there are places in Africa who haven't seen rain in years and farmers who are unable to grow anything. Folks might argue California has suffered the same but folks are forgetting that these folks weren't "rich" farmers to begin with and there's no social sa

  • The real punchline here is that nobody has a clue of what climate change will really bring. In fact, it may make areas that are currently deserts into lush, tropical paradises. And where the people are flocking to now could become deserts.

  • If you provide passage to rich countries that will give you food, water, and housing for free X immigrants will always come, were X is the carrying capacity of the TRANSPORTATION.

    There has always been war and there are billions of starving people every day. The only reason we have immigrants is because we have people pushing for immigration and many of them providing transportation. The wars and famine just get in the way of this and slow it down.

  • A person fleeing their own nation should seek a nation with their own faith and culture.
    Not too many changes and the laws and faith share something in common their own nation.

    If the West needs workers short term why not look for the best workers other more advanced nations have to offer? Why just accept lot of very random people with no skills that will need looking after for generations?
    If all the USA wanted good workers why not bring in legal guest workers who are educated from nations that have some
    • Guest workers depress wages for citizens and retard national economic development. Because they have no intention or ability to stay long term, they effectively *live* in their home country's economy while *working* in America. They are not villains, but they are unwelcome guests.

      I do support making it very easy to become a citizen, on the condition one renounces citizenship in their former country. My Irish ancestors benefited from an easy citizenship policy when fleeing the famine. They were unskilled

      • by AHuxley ( 892839 )
        Re "They were unskilled laborers who today might be derided as refugees. "
        People wanted to come to the USA and embraced freedom and democracy in the past.
        That was nice when the USA was been created and was not full of people.
        Lots of small shops, factories and exporting to keep lots of people in work. A nation had to be explored, opened and cities built.
        Lots of work by hand.
        Now the USA is full of people looking for work. The skill and unskilled work is done in nations like China, Indonesia, Cambodia,
        • Isn't widespread unemployment and the resulting destitution fundamentally a symptom of dysfunctional economic management? I don't buy the narrative that there are just "too many people".

          Can we really claim there is no useful work that needs done? Surely the country has not reached some state of infrastructural and cultural perfection where that would be plausible.

          Also.. there are way too many PhDs doing menial work in call centers etc for me to accept we have any serious skills deficit. We all know many p

          • by AHuxley ( 892839 )
            Re "doing menial work in call centers etc for me to accept we have any serious skills deficit."
            Then look after people in the USA first who want to do the "menial work". If they need more vocational support as the "menial work" needs some skill, do that.
            Why bring in random people with no skills into the USA every year when so many people in the USA with few skills are looking for work?

            Re "Can we really claim there is no useful work that needs done?"
            Find people from all over the USA who want and can wor

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