climate crisis

12 months after Cyclone Idai battered Southern Africa, more than 8.7 million people remain in desperate need of food and water. We stand in solidarity with communities still recovering, and we celebrate the women who, despite losing everything, still work tirelessly to support each other and rebuild their lives.

Tens of thousands of people across Zimbabwe, Malawi and Mozambique are still suffering 12 months after Cyclone Idai battered Southern Africa, warned Oxfam today. Cyclone Idai, one of the worst cyclones to hit Africa, made landfall on 14th March 2019.

The proposed EU climate law is a good framework for EU climate action over the next decades, Oxfam says. The Commission, national governments and the European Parliament now must enact the law and take swift and decisive action to drastically reduce climate-heating emissions.

The Horn, East and Central Africa are facing a profoundly alarming hunger crisis. More than 66 million people are in need of humanitarian aid as climate extremes have caused widespread food and water shortages. Oxfam is on the ground responding but we urgently need your help to save more lives.

Oxfam advocates for the EU to step up its climate action. It must fulfil its promise to achieve climate neutrality by 2050, increase funding for international action to fight the climate emergency and not promote false climate solutions which fuel hunger by incentivising the use of land to produce bioenergy.

Responding to the final communiqué of the COP25 climate talks in Madrid, Chema Vera, Interim Executive Director of Oxfam International, said: “The world is screaming out for climate action but this summit has responded with a whisper. The poorest nations are in a sprint for survival yet many governments have barely moved from the starting blocks."

The contentious issue of financial support for communities, including displaced communities, which have suffered loss and damage as a result of the climate crisis is expected to take center stage at the UN Climate Summit in Madrid from 2 – 13 December 2019.

Climate-fuelled disasters were the number one driver of internal displacement over the last decade – forcing an estimated 20 million people a year from their homes. While no one is immune, it is overwhelmingly poor countries that are most at risk.

More than 52 million people in 18 countries across southern, eastern and central Africa are facing up to crisis levels of hunger as a result of weather extremes, compounded by poverty and conflict.