Article | Climate Change VS Environmental Refugees | Dr (Ms) Sharad Singh | Central Chronicle

⛳ Today my article "Climate Change VS Environmental Refugees" has been published in the Sunday edition of #CentralChronicle. Please read it. 
🌷Hearty thanks Central Chronicle🙏
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Article | Climate Change VS Environmental Refugees

-    Dr (Ms) Sharad Singh
Writer, Author & Social Activist
Blogger - "Climate Diary Of Dr (Ms) Sharad Singh"

A large number of people in India are still not aware of climate change. At the same time, according to the United Nations, there will be more than 250 million environmental refugees in the world by 2030 due to global warming. So if you don't wake up now, then maybe the dawn will never happen. Environment cannot be saved just by taking pictures and promoting in the media. We have to make sincere efforts if we don't want to be environmental refugees.

Many people in developing countries are suffering from droughts and windstorms on a scale never seen before, depriving them of daily food and basic needs.  The term "environmental refugees" or “climate refugees” was first coined to describe the increasing large-scale migration and cross-border mass movements of people that were partly caused by such weather-related disasters. The term “environmental refugees” is one of the many phrases that are used to describe people who move due to changes in the environment around them. The relationship between the environment and human movement is complex, and for that reason there are a number of different phrases and definitions. Earlier there were only war refugees but now there are environmental refugees. In African countries such as Sudan and Somalia, more people have been forced into refugee lives than civil wars due to natural disasters. The water sources in their villages dried up, their cattle died due to non-availability of water, and their own lives were in danger. Due to which he was forced to leave his village, home and take refuge in other countries. But this displacement of them is illegal because the law to give asylum to environmental refugees has not yet been made in any country. Such refugees, even though they are real refugees, are neither called refugees nor do they get any help. It is predicted that due to environmental change, by 2050, about 140 million people from Africa, Latin America and South Asia will leave their mainland and migrate to other lands as environmental refuges. Environmental refugees are also increasing in India. These refugees are leaving their villages due to unavailability of water and wandering in search of work in big cities and trying to survive as daily wage laborers. Let us see an example of this, that there are reports of farmers committing suicide every day. The government gives all possible help to the farmers. Then why this committed suicide? If seen by taking off the political glasses, then the reason will be understood. After all, with the help of money given by the government, neither crop can be grown nor can it be saved. Water is a basic requirement for growing crops. We are which almost going to lose.

The heat falling since the beginning of April has broken its previous records. Water sources are drying up fast or their water level is continuously falling. We cannot escape our obligations by keeping a handful of grains and a sack of water for the birds leading a free life in the trees and puddles. As long as we have enough water to quench our thirst, we will be able to give a little water to the birds, but our thirst is now in danger. We have created a serious crisis for the present generation by throwing an ax at our feet. Indiscriminate felling of trees, unlimited extraction of sand from rivers, limiting the number of vehicles emitting toxic gas, extreme pressure of population growth on the food supply are the major reasons today due to availability of water, clean air to breathe and temperature. They are disturbing the balance and the educated section of the country is ignoring it even after seeing all this.

When the United Nations Climate Convention was signed in Rio in 1992, the US opposed the imposition of any limits on greenhouse gases. In contrast, Washington always spoke of national sovereignty when it came to deciding which gas to reduce, how, how much and when. In 1997, the US, like most countries, agreed to accede to the Kyoto Treaty, which set binding emissions reduction targets only for wealthy countries, largely responsible for carbon pollution thought to be the source of global warming are held responsible. The US agreed to it after obtaining several concessions. Bill Clinton's Vice President Al Gore signed the treaty on behalf of the US in 1998, but the Democratic Administration never gathered the necessary two-thirds majority in the Senate for formal ratification of the treaty had got. And when George W. Bush became president after Bill Clinton, the whole situation changed. Like father George Bush, Junior Bush was also opposed to a treaty that in his view allowed developing countries to burn fossil fuels and grow their economy while the hands of wealthy countries were tied to emissions limits. The treaty began in 2005 without US involvement. With Russia's signature, 55 countries required to implement the treaty had signed it after ratification. Canada later withdrew from the treaty, while New Zealand, Japan and Russia did not participate in the second phase of carbon reduction. In 2009, countries around the world gathered for a new treaty to replace the Kyoto Protocol, in which all countries, including the US, China and India, were to take proactive steps to cut carbon. But the Copenhagen Conference failed amid differences over the sharing of burdens between rich and poor countries. With the support of some other countries, the US insisted that the deal should not be called a treaty. In the end, an informal agreement was reached at the meeting in which it was agreed to limit the average global warming to 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels, but no target of cutting emissions was set. The next goal was to have a global treaty by 2015 when US President Barack Obama, along with China's Xi Jinping, gathered 195 countries, including India, for a climate treaty. The emissions targets were said to be contributions rather than commitments, which enabled Obama to ratify the treaty. Now President Joe Biden is striving for this. According to a World Bank report released in September, more than 200 million people are likely to migrate over the next three decades because of extreme weather events or the slow degradation of their environments. Most are displaced within their home country.

India is getting hit by climate change. Due to the change in the nature of rain, many rivers in the Himalayan states have changed their course. Scientists are also agreeing that the weather has started behaving strangely. Several villages in Arunachal Pradesh and Assam have been washed away in the last few decades. According to experts, many rivers have changed their course due to climate change. Northeast India receives a lot of rain. According to experts, the nature of rain has changed in the last few decades. Now it is raining heavily and for a long time. Because of this the rivers are getting flooded. Analysis of geological data has shown that some rivers have changed their course up to 300 meters away, while elsewhere they have moved 1.8 kilometers away. According to the Center for Science and Environment (CSE) based in New Delhi, the rainfall is well distributed throughout the year under normal climatic conditions. But now its nature has changed due to climate change.
If the increasing rate of environmental refuge is to be stopped, then first of all we have to stop all those works which are harming the environment. Trees will have to be saved and new trees will have to be planted and that plant will have to be protected honestly. 

The environment cannot be saved just by taking pictures and promoting in the media, for this, sincere efforts have to be made, if we also do not want to become an environmental refuge.                               

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(24.04.2022)
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