Asia-Pacific regional synthesis: climate change, displacement and the right toeducation

 How climate change impacts the right to education in Asia and the Pacific

In 2020, 30.7 million people were displaced by natural disasters – disasters which the scientific community acknowledges are more frequent and more intense as a result of climate change.

In Asia and the Pacific alone, 21.3 million people were displaced, making it the region the most impacted by national disasters and climate change in the world. Therefore, country case studies were carried out in Bangladesh,India,Indonesia, Tuvalu, and Viet Nam to examine not only specific vulnerabilities to climate change and related mobility, but also the impacts of climate change on the right to education in Asia and the Pacific.

These case studies show that climate change directly threatens education – through the destruction of schools and property – but also indirectly puts education in peril by forcing people to cross borders, ensuring neither legal residency nor the right to education.

This regional synthesis report aims to guide policy-makers through providing operational policy recommendations on how to ensure education is protected in Asia and the Pacific in the face of climate change and displacement from a human rights-based approach. The report is one of four being developed and will contribute to the global initiative on climate change and displacement and the right to education – launched by UNESCO in 2020 – by informing the development of a Global Report with global policy recommendations.

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