Climate Change and Natural Disasters

Abstract

Only 21 years ago, in 1992, the first ever convention on climate change, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was signed. The science behind studying climate change and its effects on the environment is not only mind-boggling but still in its infancy. It should come then as no surprise that the connection between climate change and natural disasters is even less studied and understood. The purpose of the present article will be to clarify from a legal perspective the interrelationship between climate change and natural disasters as well as the measures, both of an adaptation and of a mitigation nature, that have been taken in order to avoid or at least reduce the deleterious effects of such disasters. In the first Section we will examine how the notion of climate change and its connection with natural disasters has gradually found its way in international legal documents, from the 1972 Stockholm Declaration, to the 1992 Rio Declaration up until and including the Rio 20 outcome document. Following that, we will examine what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has to say on the topic based on its various Synthesis Reports and the data that are at its disposal. The third Section will examine the serious challenges that the connection between climate change and natural disasters poses with respect to evoking the international responsibility and we will conclude by examining the various treaties, projects and programmes that have been or could be activated in order to avert, mitigate or adapt to the effects arising from natural disasters caused or intensified by climate change.