Conflict or climate-related crises have forced millions of people to migrate away from their homes. The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), a member of the Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), is showcasing a thematic collection of research publications, datasets, and tools on the conflict-food insecurity-migration nexus and how conflict and food insecurity drive migration. Numerous interacting drivers and spatiotemporal dynamics contribute to conflict emergence and development. In this, understanding the role of agriculture and food systems is a potential key entry point for building resilience.
The so-called environmental or crisis migration is a consequence of reinforcing feedback loops within the conflict-food insecurity-migration nexus in combination with climate shocks and agricultural production (see graph below). Unfortunately, it is predominantly economically or politically fragile regions that are facing both climate shocks and conflict and are at the same time heavily dependent on the agricultural sector.
On the one hand, climate change and weather shocks can push people to migrate, as IFPRI research has shown. Evidence suggests that both, domestic and international migration is influenced by weather anomalies. Mainly driven by temperature changes, these anomalies adversely affect the agricultural sector through a decline in agricultural revenue, and as a consequence, increasing food insecurity. Therefore, economically motivated migration, be it rural-urban or international, is a popular coping strategy for securing livelihoods. Conflict, on the other hand, can be a result of migration and food insecurity, but also a cause. Conflicts in origin and receiving countries might be fuelled by decay in social cohesion, competition for natural resources, reduced wages, and food insecurity. These conflicts, again, increase food insecurity and migration when the agricultural sector, e.g. food price spikes, food markets, infrastructure, or access to land, is hit.
What are mitigation strategies to structurally break this vicious cycle? Conflict and migration could be more sustainably mitigated when policies and initiatives that are building resilience through agriculture and food security are incorporated in development interventions. IFPRI’s, or CGIAR’s food system research, in general, aims to develop food security strategies by addressing conflict drivers such as climate change, fragile institutions, or market fluctuations and informing food security policies and programs.
For instance, IFPRI’s 2020 Global Food Policy Report analyses the association between conflict and food insecurity and suggests policies to integrate the topic of conflict refugees into food systems. Among others, the authors recommend giving displaced people access to land to increase food security and strengthen local economies, and to apply climate-smart crop management practices for climate change adaptation. CGIAR’s Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) and other centres offer a broad range of climate-smart tools to promote programs and policies making agricultural production more resilient to climate shocks and hence mitigate involuntary migration, tensions, grievances and potential crisis. Other research areas focus on environmental peacebuilding to find synergies between the reduction of deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions on the one hand and peacebuilding in post-conflict affected areas on the other. Finally, the Food Security Portal, a collaboration by IFPRI and the European Commission, gives open-access information on food security issues, allowing policymakers to respond around the globe in time. It provides country-level data for early warning and monitoring systems and on commodity prices, as well as tools for policy analysis.
Find out more about CGIAR’s climate security work HERE.