lystn

For over 42 years, Afghanistan has endured nearly constant armed conflict, whether in the form of revolution, occupation, extremism or insurgency. This has taken a tremendous toll in human terms, but it has also exerted a powerful brake on the country’s development. Many Afghans are highly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change as a result of their exposure to droughts, floods and other natural disasters as well as their reliance on climate-sensitive livelihoods such as rain-fed agriculture and pastoralism. Meanwhile, the legacy of over four decades of conflict has increased Afghanistan’s vulnerability to climate change. In this episode, we look at Afghanistan and discuss how climate impacts are pushing its multiple burdens to the brink and what the Afghan government and international community could and should do to address the security risks presented by climate change. Our guest is Oli Brown, Associate Fellow at Chatham House and author of the climate-fragility risk brief Afghanistan. You can download the full risk brief here: https://climate-security-expert-network.org/sites/climate-security-expert-network.org/files/documents/csen_climate_fragility_risk_brief_afghanistan.pdf