IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp9349.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Environmental Disasters and Migration

Author

Listed:
  • Mbaye, Linguère Mously

    (African Development Bank)

  • Zimmermann, Klaus F.

    (University of Bonn)

Abstract

This paper reviews the effect of environmental disasters on migration. Although there is an increase of environmental disasters and migration over the past years, the relationship is complex. While some authors find that environmental disasters increase migration, others show that they have only a marginal or no effect or are even negative. Migration appears to be an insurance mechanism against environmental shocks. Remittances help to decrease households' vulnerability to shocks but also dampen their adverse effects. Finally, we discuss policy implications and future research avenues.

Suggested Citation

  • Mbaye, Linguère Mously & Zimmermann, Klaus F., 2015. "Environmental Disasters and Migration," IZA Discussion Papers 9349, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp9349
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp9349.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Leah Platt Boustan & Matthew E. Kahn & Paul W. Rhode, 2012. "Moving to Higher Ground: Migration Response to Natural Disasters in the Early Twentieth Century," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(3), pages 238-244, May.
    2. Enarson, Elaine., 2000. "Gender and natural disasters," ILO Working Papers 993439993402676, International Labour Organization.
    3. Richard Hornbeck, 2012. "The Enduring Impact of the American Dust Bowl: Short- and Long-Run Adjustments to Environmental Catastrophe," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(4), pages 1477-1507, June.
    4. Sanket Mohapatra & George Joseph & Dilip Ratha, 2012. "Remittances and natural disasters: ex-post response and contribution to ex-ante preparedness," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 14(3), pages 365-387, June.
    5. Enarson, Elaine., 2000. "Gender and natural disasters," ILO Working Papers 995164758602676, International Labour Organization.
    6. Jacob Vigdor, 2008. "The Economic Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 22(4), pages 135-154, Fall.
    7. Rosenzweig, Mark R & Stark, Oded, 1989. "Consumption Smoothing, Migration, and Marriage: Evidence from Rural India," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 97(4), pages 905-926, August.
    8. Gray, Clark & Mueller, Valerie, 2012. "Drought and Population Mobility in Rural Ethiopia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 134-145.
    9. Michel Beine & Christopher Parsons, 2015. "Climatic Factors as Determinants of International Migration," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 117(2), pages 723-767, April.
    10. repec:ilo:ilowps:343999 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Ghimire, Ramesh & Ferreira, Susana & Dorfman, Jeffrey H., 2015. "Flood-Induced Displacement and Civil Conflict," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 614-628.
    12. Combes, Jean-Louis & Ebeke, Christian, 2011. "Remittances and Household Consumption Instability in Developing Countries," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(7), pages 1076-1089, July.
    13. Catalina Amuedo-Dorantes & Susan Pozo & Carlos Vargas-Silva, 2010. "Remittances in Small Island Developing States," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(5), pages 941-960.
    14. HwaJung Choi, 2007. "Are Remittances Insurance? Evidence from Rainfall Shocks in the Philippines," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 21(2), pages 219-248, May.
    15. Arouri, Mohamed & Nguyen, Cuong & Youssef, Adel Ben, 2015. "Natural Disasters, Household Welfare, and Resilience: Evidence from Rural Vietnam," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 59-77.
    16. Ariel R. Belasen & Solomon W. Polachek, 2013. "Natural disasters and migration," Chapters, in: Amelie F. Constant & Klaus F. Zimmermann (ed.), International Handbook on the Economics of Migration, chapter 17, pages 309-330, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    17. Halliday, Timothy, 2006. "Migration, Risk, and Liquidity Constraints in El Salvador," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 54(4), pages 893-925, July.
    18. Marchiori, Luca & Maystadt, Jean-François & Schumacher, Ingmar, 2012. "The impact of weather anomalies on migration in sub-Saharan Africa," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 63(3), pages 355-374.
    19. Drabo, Alassane & Mbaye, Linguère Mously, 2015. "Natural disasters, migration and education: an empirical analysis in developing countries," Environment and Development Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 20(6), pages 767-796, December.
    20. Stark, Oded & Levhari, David, 1982. "On Migration and Risk in LDCs," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 31(1), pages 191-196, October.
    21. Gray, Clark L., 2009. "Environment, Land, and Rural Out-migration in the Southern Ecuadorian Andes," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 37(2), pages 457-468, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jasmin Gröschl & Thomas Steinwachs, 2017. "Do Natural Hazards Cause International Migration?," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 63(4), pages 445-480.
    2. Asif Ishtiaque & Nurul Islam Nazem, 2017. "Household-level disaster-induced losses and rural–urban migration: Experience from world’s one of the most disaster-affected countries," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 86(1), pages 315-326, March.
    3. Eugenia Chernina, 2019. "Natural Shocks And Migration Decisions: The Case Of Kyrgyzstan," HSE Working papers WP BRP 214/EC/2019, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    4. Thomas Steinwachs, 2019. "Geography Matters: Spatial Dimensions of Trade, Migration and Growth," ifo Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsforschung, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 81.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Mbaye, Linguere Mously & Zimmermann, Klaus F., 2016. "Natural Disasters and Human Mobility," International Review of Environmental and Resource Economics, now publishers, vol. 10(1), pages 37-56, November.
    2. Luca Marchiori & Jean-François Maystadt & Ingmar Schumacher, 2017. "Is Environmentally-induced Income Variability a Driver of Human Migration?," Working Papers 2017-010, Department of Research, Ipag Business School.
    3. Beine, Michel & Jeusette, Lionel, 2021. "A meta-analysis of the literature on climate change and migration," Journal of Demographic Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 87(3), pages 293-344, September.
    4. Linguère Mously Mbaye, 2023. "Climate change, natural disasters, and migration," IZA World of Labor, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), pages 3462-3462, November.
    5. Chiara Falco & Franco Donzelli & Alessandro Olper, 2018. "Climate Change, Agriculture and Migration: A Survey," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(5), pages 1-21, May.
    6. repec:mse:cesdoc:13045 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Simone Bertoli & Frédéric Docquier & Hillel Rapoport & Ilse Ruyssen, 2022. "Weather shocks and migration intentions in Western Africa: insights from a multilevel analysis [Do climate variations explain bilateral migration? A gravity model analysis]," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 22(2), pages 289-323.
    8. Gröger, André, 2021. "Easy come, easy go? Economic shocks, labor migration and the family left behind," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(C).
    9. Bekaert, Els & Ruyssen, Ilse & Salomone, Sara, 2021. "Domestic and international migration intentions in response to environmental stress: A global cross-country analysis," Journal of Demographic Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 87(3), pages 383-436, September.
    10. Zsoka Koczan, 2016. "Remittances during crises," The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 24(3), pages 507-533, July.
    11. Valentina Bosetti & Cristina Cattaneo & Giovanni Peri, 2021. "Should they stay or should they go? Climate migrants and local conflicts," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 21(4), pages 619-651.
    12. Michael Berlemann & Max Friedrich Steinhardt, 2017. "Climate Change, Natural Disasters, and Migration—a Survey of the Empirical Evidence," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 63(4), pages 353-385.
    13. Maya Moore & Dennis Wesselbaum, 2023. "Climatic factors as drivers of migration: a review," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 25(4), pages 2955-2975, April.
    14. Yannay Spitzer & Gaspare Tortorici & Ariell Zimran, 2020. "International Migration Responses to Modern Europe’s Most Destructive Earthquake: Messina and Reggio Calabria, 1908," NBER Working Papers 27506, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Luca Marchiori & Jean Francois Maystadt & Ingmar Schumacher, 2013. "Is environmentally," Working Papers 2013-17, Department of Research, Ipag Business School.
    16. Michel Beine & Christopher R Parsons, 2017. "Climatic Factors as Determinants of International Migration: Redux," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 63(4), pages 386-402.
    17. repec:ipg:wpaper:17 is not listed on IDEAS
    18. Katrin Millock & Cees Withagen, 2021. "Climate and Migration," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Anil Markandya & Dirk Rübbelke (ed.), CLIMATE AND DEVELOPMENT, chapter 10, pages 309-341, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    19. Castells-Quintana, David & Lopez-Uribe, Maria del Pilar & McDermott, Thomas K.J., 2018. "Adaptation to climate change: A review through a development economics lens," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 183-196.
    20. Keiti Kondi & Stefanija Veljanoska, 2023. "Internal Migration as a Response to Soil Degradation: Evidence from Malawi," LIDAM Discussion Papers IRES 2023004, Université catholique de Louvain, Institut de Recherches Economiques et Sociales (IRES).
    21. repec:ipg:wpaper:2013-017 is not listed on IDEAS
    22. Ingrid Dallmann & Katrin Millock, 2016. "Climate Variability and Internal Migration: A Test on Indian Inter-State Migration," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) halshs-00825807, HAL.
    23. Shaikh M. S. U. Eskander & Sam Fankhauser, 2022. "Income Diversification and Income Inequality: Household Responses to the 2013 Floods in Pakistan," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(1), pages 1-12, January.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    migration as insurance; remittances; forced migration; environmental shocks; floods; earthquakes; droughts;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J61 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration
    • Q54 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Climate; Natural Disasters and their Management; Global Warming
    • Q56 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Environment and Development; Environment and Trade; Sustainability; Environmental Accounts and Accounting; Environmental Equity; Population Growth

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp9349. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.