Risk Index for Climate Displacement (RICD)

Assessing Climate Displacement Risk

Co-Creation Mechanism and Symposium

Asia and the Pacific is the region most affected by disaster displacement worldwide. Disasters caused 225 million internal displacements in Asia and the Pacific during 2010-2021, accounting for 78 per cent of the global total, with 95% of them being weather-related hazards¹. Monsoon rains, tropical storms, floods, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions emerged as primary drivers, leading to 12.6 million new displacements in 2023 alone, comprising nearly 70 per cent of global disaster displacement. This corresponds to 7.1 million internally displaced persons (2.9 million in South Asia and 4.2 million in East Asia and Pacific – the latter representing a 61 per cent increase from 2022)². East Asia and the Pacific recorded the highest number of disaster displacements globally in 2023. At the same time, internal climate-induced displacement from slow-onset events is expected to increase dramatically. In the worst-case scenario, up to 48.4 million people in East Asia and Pacific, and 40.5 million in South Asia by 2050³.

To increase our understanding of the current and future impacts of climate change, especially as it relates to migration and displacement, the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the University of the Philippines Resilience Institute (UPRI) and the Asian Institute of Technology (AIT) are collaborating on a co-creation mechanism. Through this mechanism, IOM will lead the development of new, innovative tools that seek to address the complex and growing issue of climate change-induced displacement in Asia and the Pacific, for which governments in the region have consistently requested support. The overall initiative is structured around the following objectives:

1. Prevent and manage future displacement: Identifying populations at the highest likelihood of needing to move in the future due to climate shocks, allowing governments, communities, and partners to prevent and mitigate the drivers.
2. Overcome integration challenges: Identifying populations who have already migrated or been displaced due to climate shocks and are facing integration challenges, including socio-economic, social cohesion, and others, enabling targeted interventions to assist communities in overcoming these issues.
3. Create receptive locations: Forecasting areas likely to receive climate-induced migrations in the future, underpinning interventions to help prepare these locations for potential influxes, ensuring infrastructure, services, housing, jobs, and resources can cope with increased demand.
4. Manage climate security risks: Increasing understanding of the interplay between climate shocks and socio-political dynamics, highlighting potential threats to regional stability and security, providing insights to pre-emptively address and mitigate the emergence of conflicts and fragility resulting from the impacts of climate change.

This initiative brings together 21 leading scientists and experts from the Asia Pacific region in the areas of climate change, displacement, disaster risk reduction, hazard identification, socioeconomic vulnerability and resilience, as well as government.

Selected following a competitive application process that attracted applications from over 60 institutions, these experts will focus on developing two innovative tools:

• The Risk Index for Climate Displacement (RICD): a risk index and predictive model that will improve quantification, understanding and forecasting of potential future challenges linked to climate change and migration, including climate-induced displacement, that will help governments, communities, and partners to increase the resilience of populations most likely to be impacted by climate-induced displacement and working towards averting or addressing loss and damage.
• The Climate Catalytic Fund (CCF): an innovative financing tool that utilises blended finance to support governments, local private sector, and civil society in the design and implementation of projects that address the gaps highlighted by the RICD. The CCF builds on the foundation of anticipatory action while taking both a short- and long-term view, ranging from preparedness to resilience and prevention.

This initiative is a testament to IOM's commitment to promote innovation within the climate space, such as IOM’s Climate Mobility Innovation Lab, by tackling complex issues and expanding its partnership base. 

On 11-12 July 2024 in Bangkok, the IOM Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific launched the visionary co-creation mechanism in a symposium jointly hosted with UPRI and AIT, during which participants discussed the type of data and methodologies envisioned for the RICD. The symposium included a dialogue among policymakers and others interested in this topic to explore different viewpoints on climate change and displacement, as well as related policy and programmatic considerations.

Going forward, IOM will continue engagement of the scientific partners, including through co-development of the technical methodology, join authorship of technical papers, joint presentations at expert events, collaborative engagement of governments, and joint rollout of the tools in countries around the region. The RICD and CCF together are currently being piloted in Fiji, Indonesia, and the Philippines.

IOM, UPRI and AIT are grateful to the European Commission Directorate General for Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection for supporting this crucial work.

Risk Index for Climate Displacement (RICD)

The new data generated by the RICD will enable the development of innovative approaches—building on the principles of anticipatory action and forecast-based finance—to support prevention and resilience building over the long term and preparedness over the short term. This work is timely, given the increasingly severe impacts of climate change and their concomitant effect on population movements.

The RICD tool will be developed using a robust, modular approach for assessing climate displacement risk in Asia and the Pacific and by leveraging the expertise of a network of universities and other experts in the region, fostering collaboration and co-creation to achieve the following objectives:

• Develop a comprehensive, modular methodology for assessing climate displacement risk, built from smaller, manageable contributions by participating partners;
• Pilot test the methodology in selected countries within the region;
• Build capacity and knowledge among stakeholders on climate displacement risk assessment;
• Contribute to national and international policy and planning efforts by providing evidence-based insights on climate displacement risks and potential solutions.

The RICD operates on the principles of co-creation, actively engaging stakeholders at all levels throughout the project. This collaborative approach emphasizes breaking down the methodology into smaller, well-defined modules to ensure:

• Distributed expertise: Universities can contribute based on their specific strengths and research focus;
• Efficient development: Smaller modules allow for faster progress and easier iterative improvements;
• Flexibility and adaptability: Modules can be tailored to different contexts and stakeholder needs.

Climate Catalytic Fund (CCF)

To operationalize RICD, IOM created the Climate Catalytic Fund (CCF) to support catalytic investments in communities identified as facing high risk of future displacement. The goal of the CCF is to catalyse resources for priority projects put forward and implemented by local governments, civil society, and small and medium enterprises (SMEs)/private sector, in their efforts to avert, minimize and address climate-induced displacement challenges. During this pilot phase, CCF will function as a matching funds mechanism, where project developers must mobilise matching funds at least at a 1:1 ratio.

Using RICD data, the purpose of CCF projects is to target locations with a higher risk of future displacement (hotspots) and catalyse action to reduce risks and improve preparedness, building on local capacity and initiative, and in the process ensuring government buy-in. By using foresight data to prioritise locations and sectors based on potential future displacement, it builds on AA and forecast-based finance and complements the shorter-term focus of AA with a longer-term perspective.

Based on specific criteria, IOM will select specific projects from local partners. Partners will be selected based on specific eligibility criteria and shortlisted projects will undergo due diligence by IOM to ensure experience and capacity to undertake the intervention proposed, verified ability to mobilise matching funds, financial solvency and trustworthiness.

CCF is designed to elicit government financial contributions to address some of the identified challenges, alongside matching funds from this action. CCF is catalytic in that (1) it seeks to leverage smaller investments to mobilise larger public or private investments; (2) catalyses action across HDPN, including through partnerships with development actors and governments; and (3) serves as a catalyst for new and innovative.

RICD and CCF together are currently being piloted in Fiji, Indonesia, and the Philippines. IOM, UPRI, and AIT are extremely grateful to the European Commission Directorate General for Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection (ECHO) for support in the development and piloting of this work.

For more information, please contact IOM at: ricdcocreation@iomint.onmicrosoft.com.