Governments need to consider additional migration management policies and strategies

The new SOURCE issue "Climate Change and Migration: Rethinking Policies for Adaptation and Disaster Risk Reduction", edited by Michelle Leighton, Xiaomeng Shen and Koko Warner, presents the outcomes of the 2010 Summer Academy "Protecting Environmental Migrants: Creating New Policy and Institutional Framework". Using case studies conducted in both developing and developed countries, selected papers of PhD students from different academic backgrounds identify legal and institutional gaps and explore possible policy options for decision makers to be able to better protect environmental migrants. As the findings of the Academy and case studies presented in this volume reveal, human mobility is not always adverse to community development but in some circumstances may help build resilience. Better understanding the opportunities and impacts of migration, and how to protect those displaced by disaster, can help governments to improve their climate adaptation strategies. So, too can improving cooperation among neighboring states with shared natural resources and among countries of migration origin and destination.To do this effectively, governments will need to rethink existing disaster planning, migration policy, and institutional frameworks.