Climate change is already happening and represents one of the greatest environmental, social, economic and political threats facing Africa. Moreover, in line with the concept of human security, it is clear that many issues related to the impact of climate change on international security are interlinked requiring comprehensive policy responses.
Many climate models predict negative impacts of climate change on agricultural production and food security in large parts of sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The combination of its repeated exposure to droughts and floods, high reliance on rained agriculture for basic food security, and widespread degradation of its agricultural base further create foundations for continuing environmental degradation and instability on the continent. These conditions can trigger increased competition for food, land and water, creating situations with the propensity to bring about conflict.
There seems to be few, if any, parts of the continent that are immune to this general trend of decline. In the Horn/East Africa which contains large numbers of pastoralist communities, disputes involving pastoralists have increased dramatically in the past years. These disputes over access to water holes and grazing increased as available resources diminished.
In addition, though cattle rustling and clashes over grazing and farming land are relatively common in these areas, the frequency and the intensity of these disputes are on the rise. As cattle die of starvation due to drought, night raids are mounted to replace lost stock from neighboring areas. In fact, the incident in November 2012 when armed cattle raiders killed over 32 Kenyan police officers in a military-style ambush, was the worst attack on police in Kenya's history. This is just one example of many such incidents in the past years.
Climate Change should be considered as another security threat facing Africa through conflicts over scarce resources. Currently, increasing water scarcity, decreasing food security, increasing climate-induced migration, and poverty are being experienced in many parts of the continent. Therefore, climate change that has a potential to damage the natural flow of the water and food security, could increase forced migration, raise tensions and trigger new conflicts.
