A Nigerian-led research team says no fewer than 7.4 million people were displaced in Africa in 2022 due to climate change impacts.
The team disclosed this on Friday in a book released at the ongoing global climate change conference COP28 in Dubai.
Presenting the book titled “Climate Mobility Guidebook for Youth and Children” the lead researcher, Lukman Akintola, said 2.4 million of the affected persons were in Nigeria due to floods.
The data, Akintola said, was pulled from the World Bank, the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), and the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), among others.
Akintola, who is a knowledge advisor at the Global Centre for Climate Mobility Initiative, described climate mobility as a movement of people in response to the devastating impacts of climate change.
The lead researcher said the book looked at how climate change affected Africans, particularly in the area of human displacement.
“We actually pulled all these data together; we didn’t go to the field to gather them; we used existing resources to develop this.
“We have three major objectives; we want young people who want to work in climate mobility to understand what it means and their roles in climate mobility.
“This book will also help the youth who want to build careers in the climate mobility area,” he said.