This Topic Guide will support DFID advisers in the Conflict, Security and Justice Cadres as well as the Humanitarian, Climate and Environment Cadres in gaining a greater understanding of the importance and complexity of the links between conflict, climate and environment. The Topic Guide focuses on violent conflict at the sub-national, national and trans-boundary level in relation to natural resources, climate variability, climate change and environmental change. The guide concentrates on longer-term development objectives to build resilience, support adaptation, create peace and address underlying causes of vulnerability.

Key Messages

1. Climate change (natural and man-made) is already having an impact on conflict, security and fragility. Climate related stressors have played a role in, for example, the ongoing political economy of conflict in Darfur and in food insecurity across the Sahel. Climate change has also been claimed to play a complicating role in more recent conflicts in the Arab Spring, though no conflict has a single motivating factor.

For the complete article, please see Evidence on Demand.