Marginal Notes: Environmental Refugees

In 2003, the UN reported that for the first time in history, the number of environmental refugees had surpassed the number of political and war refugees.

I would argue that we need to start speaking of socio-environmental refugees, because who contributes to environmental instability, and who suffers, are most certainly linked to social, economic, and political factors.

The following clip, via YouTube, shows scenes from The 11th Hour, An Inconvenient Truth, and The Refugees of the Blue Planet:

Canadians, and Albertans, in particular, should see the film The Refugees of the Blue Planet:

Each year, millions of people the world over are driven to forced displacement. From the Maldives to Brazil, and even closer to home, here in Canada, the disturbing accounts of people who have been uprooted are amazingly similar. The enormous pressure placed on rural populations as a result of the degradation of their life-supporting environment is driving them increasingly further from their way of life. The Refugees of the Blue Planet sheds light on the little-known plight of a category of individuals who are suffering the repercussions of this reality: environmental refugees. They are constantly growing in number and often have no legal status, even though their right to a clean and sustainable environment has been violated.