From 1985-1992, the numbers of officially recognized refugees has sharply risen from 10 million to over 23 million people plus an additional 30 million or more people considered "internally displaced." Refugee camps are filled to the brim, & assistance dollars required to aid only these recognized masses is at an all time high. The only way the assistance community can minimize a situation of triage is to recognize the root causes forcing migration & address the problem at the source. The cost will be far less & a great part of this growing tragedy could be averted. Environmental degradation & human population growth pressures play an unrecognized, yet significant, role as an impetus to forced human migration. As worsening trends persist in these areas, their role will become even greater, perhaps the greatest reason behind forced migration. Dr. Norman Myers, world renowned for his efforts in biodiversity & human population growth, with the assistance of a world class advisory committee has taken on this ambitious assignment to assess the impact of environmental & population pressures on forced migration & produced a compelling account of this emergent phenomenon.

He finds that there are today at least 25 million environmental refugees, whose primary reason for fleeing their homes was because their natural environment could no longer sustain their life. Dr. Myers projects that this number will be dwarfed in the future when the world could host as many as 200 million environmental refugees when faced with the implications of a globally warmed world. To order contact: Climate Institute, 324 4th St. NE, Washington, DC 20002-5821, 202-547-0104.