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For Fast-Growing Countries, Should Aging Be a Concern? Planning for the Second Demographic Dividend
›September 10, 2013 // By Elizabeth Leahy Madsen
Population aging and decline are frequently described as a threat to countries’ economic development and social stability. Evocative language, such as “demographic winter” and “graying of the great powers,” portrays the serious consequences that many observers envision as fertility and growth rates decline and the elderly comprise a greater percentage of the population. These concerns reach around the globe, including in Africa, which has the lowest percentage of elderly among the world’s major regions.
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DOD’s Daniel Chiu: Climate, Energy Concerns Emblematic of Future Security Challenges
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Factoring in the costs of fuel in operations, both in terms of the monetary and battlefield effect, is a relatively new development for the U.S. military. “Our view was, when we were at war, we would bear those costs,” says U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy Daniel Chiu in this week’s podcast. “However, as we have started to appreciate the nature of the kinds of military challenges we face, we’ve realized this is not a sustainable approach.”
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India’s Assam Shows Second-Order, Dangerous Effects of Climate Change in South Asia
›August 13, 2013 // By Ashley Ziegler
To use the military parlance, climate change is often considered a “threat multiplier,” challenging stability and development around the world by exacerbating underlying conditions of vulnerability. South Asia is one region that faces multiple stressors that have the potential to feedback off each other.
Higher temperatures, more extreme weather, rising sea levels, flooding, and increased cyclonic activity in the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea are reshaping the environment, warns the Center for American Progress (CAP) in a report.
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Young People Are Transforming Afghanistan, Says Maiwand Rahyab
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“I would like to challenge the conventional and popular perceptions about Afghanistan and expose a deeper story of commitment and determination, of struggle and success, of hope and change,” says Counterpart International’s Maiwand Rahyab in this week’s podcast.
Today – almost 12 years after the United States and its allies invaded Afghanistan – is the next generation of Afghans better off? With 26 percent of girls giving birth before age 18, 1 in 10 Afghan children dying before the age of five, and young people leaving the country in large numbers, this seems like a fair question.
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Mark Montgomery: More Data on Urban-to-Urban Migration Needed
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“If I ask you to consider the image in your mind of a migrant girl, probably you – like me – have a vision of a girl embarking from a rural village on a trek to the city,” says Mark Montgomery of the Population Council in this week’s podcast. But, “Is that what the empirical realities show?”
Perhaps not: “It is far more common for urban and migrant girls to come from other cities and towns than it is for them to come from rural villages,” he explains.
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Vulnerability View: GAIN Index Rates Climate Change Preparedness
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According to the UN, the planet has warmed faster since the turn of the century than any other period on record. Sea-level rise has also increased pace to 0.12 inches a year – almost double the rate observed during the 20th century. This “unprecedented” rate of climate change is expected to disproportionally impact developing countries, whose socio-economic, political, and physical landscapes make them particularly vulnerable to the effects. The GAIN Index, an interactive mapping tool recently acquired by the University of Notre Dame, can help policymakers prepare for these changes by comparing the climate change vulnerability and readiness of countries around the world.
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Miriam Temin: Migrant Girls, Forced or Not, Need Safety Nets
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“There’s a common myth that migrant girls are forced to move against their will, but in fact what we’ve found through our research is that most migrant girls are involved in the decision to move,” said the Population Council’s Miriam Temin in this week’s podcast.
Temin spoke at the launch of her and her colleagues’ new report, Girls on the Move: Adolescent Girls and Migration in the Developing World, about the economic incentives for girls to migrate and the risks involved for them.
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Lisa Friedman: Bangladesh Shows Importance of Expanding Coverage of Climate-Induced Migration
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“What I found in Bangladesh was that [climate migration] wasn’t a straight line,” says Lisa Friedman in this week’s podcast. It’s “a far more complicated story.”
Friedman is the deputy director of ClimateWire, a news service that brings readers daily information related to climate change and its effects on business and society. At the launch of ECSP’s new report, Backdraft: The Conflict Potential of Climate Mitigation and Adaptation, Friedman discussed her experiences reporting on climate-induced migration in Bangladesh – one of the most vulnerable countries to climate change in the world, due to its low-lying geography, dense population, and high poverty levels.
Showing posts from category migration.
