Online event: Climate change, environmental degradation and conflict

Across the world, climate change and environmental degradation have sweeping impact on local communities. In areas affected by ongoing conflict like the Sahel, the Horn of Africa, and parts of the Middle East, they are causing mass food insecurity, displacing millions, undermining human security, and increasing the risks of further escalations. Meanwhile, conflict itself is diminishing people’s ability to adapt to major environmental challenges, such as desertification, salinisation and land erosion.

Interrupting this cycle of environmental breakdown and insecurity requires simultaneous and coordinated action in both the climate and the conflict pillars. This online event will convene high-level actors across policy, practice and academia, to explore how to accelerate adaptation and ecosystem restoration, while working to end violent conflict and create sustainable peace, with reflections on how developments at COP27 can be harnessed to this end.

Introductory remarks by Ibrahim Thiaw, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification

Speakers:

• Michael Obersteiner, Director of the Environmental Change Institute at the University of Oxford
• Janani Vivekananda, Head of Climate Diplomacy and Security Programme at adelphi
• Stephanie Roe (TBD), Global Climate and Energy Lead Scientist at WWF International

Moderated by  Andrew Gilmour, Executive Director of the Berghof Foundation