This fall, the National Intelligence Council released an intelligence community assessment of the extent to which factors such as climate change, severe weather, conflict, resource scarcity, disease, poor governance, and environmental degradation will impact peoples’ purchasing power and food availability over the next decade. They found “the overall risk of food insecurity in many countries of strategic importance to the United States will increase.”

Security, terrorism, conflict, and peace: you won’t find any of these words in the landmark agreement released on December 12 at the 2015 Paris Climate Conference (COP-21). It’s never been front-and-center on the agenda at previous Conference of Parties, from Copenhagen to Cancun. But in Paris, a city reeling from terrorist attacks, the specter of climate-related conflict haunted delegates and the potential of a climate-resilient peace inspired grassroots protests.

The effect of climate change on the emergence of violent conflict has become one of the more lively academic debates and is even bleeding over into the mainstream. Despite a substantial number of studies, results are contradictory and somewhat inconclusive.

Last month, for the first time, 195 countries formally agreed to take steps to slow and eventually reduce carbon emissions. “This is potentially one of the most important things that’s ever been done for your children, your grandchildren…and their welfare in the future,” said Andrew Light, professor of public philosophy at George Mason University. [Video Below]

Who walks away from fertile agricultural land available to lease for as little as $1 per year per hectare? Recent reports indicate international investors are doing just that across sub-Saharan Africa.

One of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s first priorities after winning an overwhelming victory last year on a platform of development and growth is to fast-track a decades-old plan to link India’s rivers.

Global attention is understandably focused on Syrian refugees, but the migration crisis in Europe is part of a bigger trend that climate and social scientists have been warning about for years.

Joginder Singh, a 68-year-old farmer in the village of Noopur Bet in Punjab, is among the thousands of farmers in India trying to reconcile the risks posed by a changing climate with their need to improve crop yields to support their families.