CLIMATE change could force up to 40.5 million people across South Asia to move by 2050 under a worst-case scenario, as rising seas, floods and droughts threaten homes and livelihoods, the United Nations migration chief has warned.
International Organization for Migration (IOM) director-general Amy Pope told AFP during a visit to New Delhi on Oct 16 that better technology, early intervention and government investment could help communities adapt before disasters force them from their homes.
“When they can’t produce food, when they can’t feed their livestock, it increases the likelihood of displacement,” Pope said. “The first adaptation is often for people to move.”
She cited a disaster in Nepal on Aug 26, when a mountain and glacier collapse triggered deadly flooding, prompting the IOM to provide humanitarian assistance.
In India, climate pressures are also accelerating urbanisation as people seek refuge from extreme heat.
“As people seek shelter from heat, they’re going into urban centres,” Pope said.
She warned that vulnerable communities faced mounting risks while global action and funding for climate adaptation remained inadequate.
“There’s a lack of urgency globally about the risks that vulnerable communities are facing,” she said.
“The cost of a humanitarian disaster is in the billions. The cost of investing in some of the resilience measures can be far less.”
Pope said advances in artificial intelligence and forecasting could help governments identify communities most at risk of displacement by combining weather projections with information on local livelihoods.
“With the advancements in AI forecasting, you can now better anticipate those communities that are at high risk of displacement,” she said.
“If you know a community is at risk, we don’t need to wait until they’re displaced to respond.”
Preventive measures could include improving farming practices, retraining workers for alternative livelihoods and relocating communities repeatedly affected by floods or droughts.
However, securing funding for climate adaptation remains a major obstacle, with governments often struggling to navigate the mechanisms available to finance such programmes.
Pope pointed to India’s investment in early-warning systems, disaster response and technology as grounds for optimism, while stressing that governments could not tackle the scale of the challenge alone.
She also described international migration as a potential tool for development, allowing workers to earn incomes abroad while helping address labour shortages in destination countries.
South Asia’s established migration routes could provide a foundation for expanding such opportunities, she said.
“Here we have government partners who recognise both the threats to their communities but they’re also using migration as a tool for development,” Pope said.
However, she warned that growing overseas demand for workers must be matched by safe and legal employment pathways to prevent exploitation by traffickers and smugglers, including through fraudulent job offers.
India’s technological capabilities could also help its workers prepare for changes in the global labour market as artificial intelligence reshapes employment.
While AI could threaten jobs involving routine analysis of documents and reports, Pope said workers could benefit if skills training kept pace with emerging opportunities in sectors that continued to require human labour.
“If we can marry that capacity with the labour mobility, so that the workers are being skilled for those jobs as they’re emerging, they will be ahead,” she said.
“This is a place where I have more optimism than in places where we’re dealing with the most acute crises,” she added. - October 16, 2026
