Climate change and migration: the case of Africa

• Authors: Bruno Conte.
• BSE Working Paper: 1411 | October 23
• Keywords: migration , climate change , economic geography
• JEL codes: O15, Q54, R12

How will future climate change affect Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) in terms of migration and welfare? Can policymakers help SSA to adapt to this process? I answer these questions with a quantitative framework that, coupled with rich spatial data and forecasts for the future climate, projects millions of climate mi- grants and unequal welfare losses across SSA. Investigating migration and trade liberalization as policy tools, I find persistent inequality in welfare losses if only reducing migration barriers in SSA. Reducing both trade and migration barriers is welfare-improving in aggregate and distributional terms.