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‘Cascading impacts’: Military leaders warn climate change is Australia’s biggest threat

A new report says emissions reductions must be accelerated as climate emerges as the nation's biggest security threat.

A new report says emissions reductions must be accelerated as climate emerges as the nation's biggest security threat. Photo: Getty

Some of Australia’s most experienced military leaders are warning that climate change is the biggest national security threat and that governments must do more to mitigate risks.

A report by former defence chief Admiral Chris Barrie on Tuesday said the climate crisis will deepen regional shortages of food and water, potentially destabilising nations and displacing millions.

Robert Glasser, a senior fellow at ASPI and a former special representative on disaster risk reduction for the United Nations Secretary General, told TND that governments must recognise the climate crisis is a “whole of system change” that will have huge implications for security.

“When you look at great power competition with China, in a way you can think about it as chess pieces. Each country is moving on a board throughout the region,” Glasser said.

“Climate change is upending the board.

“You have these cascading impacts on people movements, on food and political instability – great powers can take advantage of all those disruptions.”

University of Queensland Professor Matt McDonald said the Australian Security Leaders Climate Group (ASLCG) report reflects “frustration” with inaction on those growing national security risks.

He said the ASLCG want government to “move beyond rhetoric” and act on security implications from climate change like other nations, including Australia’s key allies, have already been doing.

Climate mobility

One of the biggest risks outlined in Barrie’s report is the potential for massive displacement of people throughout Southeast Asia and the Pacific as rising sea levels hit archipelago nations.

This has wider geopolitical implications too, particularly as nations most exposed to climate change look to bigger powers in the region – including Australia and China – for support.

“Higher temperatures; more extreme weather events, including heatwaves, cyclones and fires; changes to local climates threatening water and food supply; and rising sea levels are all examples of major threats affecting our global and national security,” the report said.

“These accelerating climate impacts are expected to increase the risk of civil unrest, conflicts and fuel mass refugee movement within our region over the coming decades.”

James Cook University lecturer Liam Moore cautioned, however, that warnings about millions of people being displaced can be a “harmful narrative” and that the human mobility caused by climate change will take on many dimensions.

“While emissions reduction and mitigation needs to be given the highest possible importance, we also need to be working to ensure communities can adapt, and that those who do choose to move have a number of options to do so,” he explained.

“These should include internal, cross-border, and circular mobility pathways.”

Glasser said that while many people in the past who were displaced by natural disasters went back to those areas or settled nearby, there is a risk that “serious, repeating and intensifying” natural hazards will make that impossible in the future.

He said a key risk is Indonesia, which is immediately north of Australia and is home to more than 250 million people living on low lying islands that are “extremely exposed to climate hazards”.

“There is a clear risk moving forward of big population movements,” Glasser said.

Moore said Australia’s Pacific neighbours, including Fiji, Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands, have all outlined plans for climate mobility that can be used to help develop Australian policies.

“We don’t have to start from scratch,” he said.

Prepare and prevent

A key recommendation in the Barrie report calls on the federal government to adopt a policy of “responsibility to prepare and prevent”, reflecting a leading role for Australia on climate change.

It would include stepping up funding for developing nations to help them accelerate their own climate action plans, and “mobilising all resources necessary to reach net zero emissions as soon as possible”.

Moore welcomed that recommendation, but said there are migration and displacement risks in Australia too, including Grantham in Queensland’s Lockyer Valley and sections of the northern rivers system in New South Wales.

“There are market issues they are overlooking, [including] the very real fears about how insurance agencies will handle an increase in hazards and what effect that will have on people’s ability to remain where they are or need to move,” Moore said.

“There is [also] still a lack of detail on who is implementing these initiatives on the ground or responding to disasters.

“Too much of Australia’s response relies on an aging volunteer population – this is unsustainable in the long-term and it may be time for authorities to think about an expansion of the professional workforce dedicated to disaster preparedness, response, and recovery.”

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