Climate shocks forced over 100,000 people to flee their homes in Burundi: charity

Natural disasters caused by climate change have forced more than 100,000 people to flee their homes in Burundi in recent years, British charity Save the Children said in a new report released on Monday.

He said climate shocks – not conflict – were now the main cause of internal displacement in the landlocked East African country, which has a largely rural population.

“More than 84 percent of all internally displaced people in Burundi (…) have been displaced by natural disasters rather than conflicts, mainly due to the rise of Lake Tanganyika, the second largest lake from Africa, ”said the association.

Children have been particularly affected, he added, adding: “An estimated 7,200 of the displaced – or 7% of the total number – are babies under one year old.”

Older children cannot go to school and many survive on just one meal a day, the association said.

Arielle, a teenage girl whose home was engulfed in the middle of the night by the rising waters of the lake, told Save the Children she was struggling to make a living, earning $ 1.20 (one euro) per day to transport and stack bricks.

“I eat almost every day, but some days I skip meals completely,” said the 17-year-old.

“A flagrant injustice”

Displaced farmers told the organization that catastrophic flooding has intensified in recent years.

“The flood situation has become worse than before. This time the flood has swept over everything and never returned,” said Marie, a mother of three.

“I’m afraid the children will starve.”

Maggie Korde, national director of the charity for Rwanda and Burundi, warned: “The world seems to have forgotten Burundi, yet it is bearing the brunt of global climate change, children being the most affected.

“We see families that previously had solid homes, all the kids in school and two working parents, reduced to living in tents with no jobs, no food, and the kids have to work for a dollar a day to provide for the living. their family’s needs, ”she said. noted.

“It is a blatant injustice for a community which has already experienced so much difficulty.”

The report comes two years after relentless rains affected nearly two million people in East Africa and left at least 265 dead, according to an AFP tally.

The extreme weather conditions have been attributed to the large difference in sea surface temperature between the western and eastern parts of the Indian Ocean, warmer waters leading to higher evaporation and humid air flowing towards the sea. interior of the continent in the form of rain.

The waters around East Africa have been about two degrees Celsius warmer than those in the East Indian Ocean near Australia – an imbalance far beyond the norm.

A leaked UN climate science report, viewed exclusively by AFP in June, predicts that flooding will displace 2.7 million people in Africa each year in the future and could contribute to 85 million people. people will be driven from their homes by 2050.