CLIMATE AND SECURITY

Relaunch of hub on environment, climate and security

The Protection of Civilians site near Bentiu, South Sudan, houses over 40,000 displaced persons seeking shelter from armed conflict in the area. Significant flooding during the rainy season add to poor living conditions for both the short and long term. Photo: JC McIlwaine/UN Photo

Swedish government launches second phase of the Stockholm Hub on Environment, Climate and Security, building knowledge on how climate and environmental change lead to human insecurities

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Following a successful first phase (2018–20), the Swedish government decided in May 2022 that the Stockholm Hub on Environment, Climate and Security should continue its work on understanding how environmental change interact with human insecurity, tensions and conflicts.

The hub consists of four leading Stockholm-based research institutes - Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, Stockholm Environment Institute, Stockholm International Water Institute and the Stockholm Resilience Centre.

Together they will develop insights into how to build security and prosperity and strengthen societies’ resilience in the face of a changing climate.

At the launch, Sweden’s Foreign Minister Ann Linde highlighted the importance of understanding and managing natural resources to avoid competition which can in turn lead to conflict. 

Sweden’s Minister for Development Aid Matilda Ernkrans noted that this collaboration will help support the most vulnerable countries in the best way through evidence-based analysis and dialogue.

Threat to human security

The effects of climate change, together with environmental degradation and declining biodiversity, have major consequences for the earth's natural resources and the human environment. This in turn will have direct impact on people's livelihoods and increasing the risk of conflict.

“To sustain peace, development must focus on the Earth system – humanity’s life support system – and help a growing population to weather future storms,” says centre researcher Albert Norström.

He will be contributing to the hub together with other centre colleagues including Cibele Queiroz.

“The Stockholm Hub will contribute to a better understanding of how the combined effects of biodiversity loss and climate change can lead to thresholds and tipping points being crossed in the Earth’s biosphere and how these can pose a primary threat to human security,” she explains.

The Stockholm Hub on Environment, Climate and Security

SRC director Line Gordon (left) together with Torgny Holmgren (director SIWI), Matilda Ernkrans (Sweden’s Minister for Development Aid), Jan Eliasson (Chair of the SIPRI Governing Board), Ann Linde (Sweden’s Foreign Minister), Åsa Persson (Deputy Director SEI) and Dan Smith (director SIPRI). Photo: A. Manolache/SIPRI

Published: 2022-05-20

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