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Research & Articles

Hang Together or Separately? How global co-operation is key to a fair and adequate climate deal at Copenhagen (June 2009) (PDF 600KB)
This report outlines a fair way to deliver the emissions cuts which the science says are needed to avoid catastrophic climate change. The report's proposals include a new Global Mitigation Finance Mechanism which would use money from the sale of carbon permits to enable developing countries to reduce poverty and progress development whilst contributing to global emissions reductions.
The right to survive - The humanitarian challenge for the twenty-first century (April 2009)(PDF 2.2MB)
By 2015 more than 375 million people are likely to be affected by climate related disasters – a projected increase of 54% – and this threatens to overwhelm the world’s current capacity to respond. A fundamental overhaul in the way the world responds to international humanitarian crisis is required to address these growing pressures, worsened by the looming threat of climate change.
Survival of the fittest: Pastoralism and climate change in East Africa (August 2008) (PDF 346KB)
Pastoralists in East Africa have been adapting to climate variability for millennia and their adaptability ought to enable them to cope with the growing challenge of climate change. This Oxfam International briefing paper explains the policies required to enable sustainable and productive pastoralist communities to cope with the impact of climate change and generate sustainable livelihoods
Financing adaptation: Why the UN’s Bali Climate Conference must mandate the search for new funds (December 2007) (PDF 220KB)
Oxfam estimates that adapting to climate change in developing countries is likely to cost at least $50bn each year, and far more if global greenhouse-gas emissions are not cut fast enough. Yet international funding efforts to date have been woeful. In the year that the world's scientists made the science irrefutable, the world's politicians must now deliver the finance needed so that the most vulnerable countries can cope with the new reality that they face.
It’s about Justice (PDF 22KB)
A statement signed by more than 40 organisations calling on Northern governments to take on binding commitments to finance adaptation in developing countries.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Synthesis Report – draft copy (November 2007) (PDF 5.8MB)
The IPCC's synthesis report's findings on "climate change 2007".
Up in Smoke? Asia and the Pacific – the threat from climate change to human development and the environment (November 2007) (PDF 2.3MB)
Global warming is set to reverse decades of social and economic progress across Asia, home to more than four billion people or 60 percent of the world’s population, according to this multi-agency report.
Two degrees, one chance: the urgent need to curb global warming (2007) (PDF 297KB)
Human-induced climate change is already happening. People, particularly poor people, struggle with its impacts every day. While world leaders argue over how to tackle this immense issue, one thing must be agreed on now: the level of change the world needs to avoid.
Adapting to climate change: what's needed in poor countries, and who should pay (May 2007) (PDF 493KB)
Climate change is forcing vulnerable communities in poor countries to adapt to unprecedented climate stress. This Oxfam briefing paper argues that rich countries, primarily responsible for creating the problem, must stop harming, by fast cutting their greenhouse-gas emissions, and start helping, by providing finance for adaptation.
Where has all the water gone? Understanding climate change from a community perspective. Northern KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa (April 2007) (PDF 927KB)
This report looks at the issue of climate change from the perspective of poor rural women and men living in northern KwaZulu-Natal. It documents their understandings of climate change, their experience of its impacts, and their efforts to live, learn and adapt to the changes.
Adapting to climate change - challenges and opportunities for the development community (2006) (PDF 1.2MB)
An Institute of Development Studies report examining the concept of "adaption" to climate change and its relevance for the work of development agencies.