A Catch 22 or an Opportunity?

Climate change and instability in the Middle East and North Africa
The cases of Syria and Egypt

Francesco Femia and Caitlin E. Werrell

Co-Directors
The Center for Climate and Security
www.climateandsecurity.org
 Climate-Water-Food Nexus
• Climate Change manifests itself primarily
through water and food

• Admiral Titley, USN (ret): “It’s all about

the water”
– Variability
• Too much
• Too little
• Wrong place, wrong time
• Wet where it was dry
• Dry where it was wet
• Drier where it was dry
• Salty where it was fresh
• Change in chemistry

• And the food: Increased water insecurity

due to climate variability, both globally
and in the Middle East and North Africa
(MENA), has a significant effect on food
security in the region
 Syria: Drought
• 2007-2010: Worst drought
in Syria’s history of records

• 2011 Global Assessment

Report on Disaster Risk
Reduction (GAR):
– Farmers: Of those
most vulnerable, 75%
suffer total crop failure
– Herders in northeast: Standard Precipitation Index (SPI) (-1 = moderate drought; -2 = extreme drought).
Lose 85% of their Drought, Five-year Scale, Syria from 2006 to 2012

livestock, affecting 1.3 Source: Werrell, Femia and Sternberg, “

Did We See it Coming? State Fragility, Climate Vulnerability, and the Uprisings in Syria and Eg
million people ypt
,” SAIS Review of International Affairs, Volume 35, Number 1, Winter-Spring 2015, pp. 29-46

Source: W. Erian et al., Drought Vulnerability in the Arab Region Special Case Study: Syria (Geneva: United Nations
International Strategy for Disaster Reduction, 2010), pp11.
 Livelihoods decimated
• 2009 UN and IFRC: 800,000 Syrians lost entire
livelihood as a result of the droughts

• 2010 UN: 2-3 million driven into extreme poverty

• 2011 GAR: 1 million Syrians left

“extremely food insecure” by droughts

Source: F. Femia and C. Werrell, 2012. ‘Syria: Climate Change, Drought and Social Unrest’, The Center for
Climate and Security, 29 Feb. 2012.
 Internal displacement
• October 2010: UN estimates 50,000 families migrated from
rural areas just that year, “on top of the hundreds of
thousands of people who fled in earlier years.”

• January 2011: crop failures just in farming villages around

Aleppo lead “200,000 rural villagers to leave for the cities.”

• Total 2007-2011: 1.3 – 1.5 million people displaced, most

move to urban areas.

Source: F. Femia and C. Werrell, 2012. ‘Syria: Climate Change, Drought and Social Unrest’, The Center for
Climate and Security, 29 Feb. 2012.
 Climate change
• 2011 NOAA: High likelihood winter drying
from 1971-2010 in Mediterranean littoral
and Middle East linked to climate change.
Syria one of driest.

• 2015 Kelley et al: 2007-2010 drought 2-3x

more likely due to climate change

• IFPRI climate model: If current rates of global

greenhouse gas emissions continue, yields of
rainfed crops in Syria may decline “between
29 and 57 percent from 2010 to 2050.”
Sources:
M. Hoerling et al., “On the Increased Frequency of Mediterranean Drought,”
Journal of Climate 25 (2012), pp.2146–61.
Reds and oranges highlight lands around the Mediterranean that experienced
Kelley, Colin et al, 2015. Climate change in the Fertile Crescent and implications significantly drier winters during 1971-2010 than the comparison period of 1902-
of the recent Syrian drought. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 2010
(Impact Factor: 9.81). 03/2015; 112(11)

C. Breisinger et al, 2010. “Food Security and Economic Development in the

Middle East and North Africa: Discussion Paper 00985,” International Food Policy Source: M. Hoerling et al., “On the Increased Frequency of Mediterranean
Research Institute. Drought,” Journal of Climate 25 (2012), pp.2146–61.
 Climate change

Winter precipitation trends in the Mediterranean

region for the period 1902 – 2010 (Hoerling et al.
2011).
 Natural resource
mismanagement
• Heavily-subsidized water-intensive wheat and cotton farming
• Encouragement of inefficient irrigation techniques: e.g. flood
irrigation – 60% of water used is wasted
• Over-pumping of groundwater: Syria’s National Agricultural
Policy Center: increase in wells tapping aquifers from “just over
135,000 in 1999 to more than 213,000 in 2007…caused
groundwater levels to plummet in many parts of the country...”
• 2007: Syria consumed 19.2 billion cubic metres of water - 3.5
billion more than the amount of water replenished naturally
• Some evidence of well-drilling contracts awarded on sectarian
basis
Source: F. Femia and C. Werrell, 2012. ‘Syria: Climate Change, Drought and Social Unrest’, The Center for Climate and Security,
29 Feb. 2012.
 Demographics &
desertification

• Over-grazing of land
• Rapidly growing population
• Rising demand for meat from growing and
increasingly affluent population
• Contributes to land degradation and water
insecurity

Source: F. de Châtel, 2014. The Role of Drought and Climate Change in the Syrian Uprising: Untangling the Triggers of the
Revolution. Middle Eastern Studies. Vol. 50, Iss. 4, 2014, pp. 3)
 Pressure on urban areas
• Context: Syrian cities coping with influxes of Iraqi refugees since
2003, steady influx of Palestinian refugees, and from 2007-2011,
around 1.5 million Syrian farmers and herders

• Cities already experiencing serious water infrastructure

deficiencies – e.g. Damascus water network leaks up to 60
percent of the water it carries, according to local authorities

• 2007-2011: Francesca de Châtel: Syria experienced a “huge

deterioration of [water] availability per capita,” partly as a result
of a crumbling urban infrastructure.
Source: F. Femia and C. Werrell, 2012. ‘Syria: Climate Change, Drought and Social Unrest’, The Center for Climate and Security,
29 Feb. 2012.
 Rural communities & unrest
• Role of disaffected rural communities in early Syrian
opposition movement prominent compared to
equivalents in other “Arab uprising” countries.
• 2011: Rural farming town of Dara’a focal point for
protests in early stages of the opposition movement
– a place especially hard hit by five years of drought
and water scarcity
Source: F. Femia and C. Werrell, 2012. ‘Syria: Climate Change, Drought and Social Unrest’, The Center for
Climate and Security, 29 Feb. 2012.
 Egypt
– Produces little of its own Per Capita Top Wheat Importing Countries,
Percent Income Spent on Food and Average Age
food/ essential staples
(bread)
– Depends on stability of
global wheat market
– Net grain importer (one of
8 of 10 MENA nations
most dependent on global
wheat market)
– Bread subsidies
insufficient to control price Source: ERS, Food CPI and Expenditures Briefing Room, Table 97,
2011. Cited in: Troy Sternberg, “Chinese drought, bread and the
Arab Spring,” Applied Geography 34 (2012): 519–524.
 Drought in China and Russia
(-1=drought; -2=extreme drought)

• 2010 drought in China

• 2010 heat wave in Russia (more likely due
to climate change)*
• Wheat harvests devastated
• China and Russia purchase significant
amount of wheat on global market
• Global wheat prices spike – Egypt affected
*Sources:
Drought at One- to-Three-Month Timescales November 2010
Stefan Rahmstorf and Dim Coumou, “Increase of Extreme
through January 2011. Standard Precipitation Index (SPI).
Events in a Warming World,” Proceedings of the National
Source: Werrell, Femia and Sternberg, “
Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 108, no. Did We See it Coming? State Fragility, Climate Vulnerability, and the
44 (November 2011): 17905–17909.
Uprisings in Syria and Egypt
,” SAIS Review of International Affairs, Volume 35, Number 1,
Friederike E. L. Otto et al., “Reconciling Two
Winter-Spring 2015, pp. 29-46
Approaches to Attribution of the 2010 Russian Heat
Wave,” Geophysical Research Letters 39, no. 4
(February 2012).
 Rural bread riots coincide with Tahrir square

• Bread prices rise 300% in Egypt

• Bread subsidies regime corrupt,
does not affect price of bread
in rural areas
• At least three major reported
bread riots in 2011
• May have broadened appeal of
uprising beyond urban areas

Sources:

Werrell, Femia and Sternberg, “Did We See it Coming? State Fragility, Climate Vulnerability, and the Uprisings in Syria and Egypt,” SAIS Review of

International Affairs, Volume 35, Number 1, Winter-Spring 2015, pp. 29-46

Marco Lagi et al., “The Food Crises and Political Instability in North Africa and the Middle East,” New England Complex Systems Institute, August 10,
 Syria and Egypt: Environmental
Security Drivers
• Environmental
security variables
and attendant
impacts generally
missing from
analysis of Syria
and Egypt fragility

• Complexity

• Outdated
predictive tools Source: Werrell, Femia and Sternberg, “
Did We See it Coming? State Fragility, Climate Vulnerability, and the Uprisings in Syria and Eg
and indices? ypt
,” SAIS Review of International Affairs, Volume 35, Number 1, Winter-Spring 2015, pp. 29-46
 Syria: Immune to the Arab uprisings?
• Many political & intelligence analysts predict Syria is
immune to drivers that precipitated the Arab uprisings in
Tunisia, Egypt, Libya
• Obama administration: Developed list of nations likely to
be at risk of large-scale political turmoil: Syria at bottom
of list.
• “No one was focused on Syria, because it seemed far less
likely than other states in the region…” – U.S. Deputy
Secretary of State James Steinberg

Source: J.Mann. 2012. ‘The Obamians: The Struggle Inside the White House to Redefine American Power’, pg 270, Viking
Press.
 Catch-22…
Self-sufficient, or dependent on global food
market, countries are vulnerable to climate risks.

• Syria by 2050: Rainfed crops decrease up to

57%

• Nile Delta:

• 30-40% Egypt’s agriculture production

• 30% Egypt labor force agrarian

• Alexandria Egypt – 0.5 meter rise seas

would displace 2 mil people.
Sources:
Alexandria, Egypt
F. Femia and C. Werrell, 2012. ‘Syria: Climate Change, Drought and Social Unrest’, The
Center for Climate and Security, 29 Feb. 2012.

F. Femia and C. Werrell, 2011, ‘’Egypt’s Political Transition and the Rising Sea: An
Opportunity for Reform’, The Center for Climate and Security, 16 Jan. 2012
 Or opportunity…
• Solutions could be leveraged for conflict-resolution
• Historical precedent of cooperation between conflicting
parties over scarce water resources, in particular*
• Resources devoted to climate adaptation in the region
must become a higher development and security priority
• Climate adaptation should become a new form of
development and security assistance
• Alternatives to water-intensive crop production, and flood
irrigation
*Source: Wolf, A. T. "International Water Conflict Resolution: Lessons from Comparative Analysis." International Journal of Water
Resources Development. Vol. 13 #3, December 1997.
 Lessons for analysis

• Environmental/ natural resource

security variables are unexplored
potential drivers of unrest in
Syria and Egypt

• More research needed to

disentangle lines of causality

• Environmental security/ natural

resource variables need better
integration into indices and Source: World Economic Forom, Global Risks Report 2014

predictive tools on state fragility,

conflict,
Source: global
Werrell, Femia and risks,
Sternberg, “Did We See itetc.
Coming? State Fragility, Climate Vulnerability, and the Uprisings in Syria and Egypt,” SAIS Review of International Affairs,

Volume 35, Number 1, Winter-Spring 2015, pp. 29-46

 Questions?
• Francesco Femia: ffemia@climateandsecurity.org

• The Center for Climate and Security: www.climateandsecurity.org

• Climate and Security 101: www.climatesecurity101.org

• F. Femia and C. Werrell, 2012. ‘Syria: Climate Change, Drought and Social Unrest
’, The Center for Climate and Security, 29 Feb. 2012.

• Werrell, Femia and Sternberg, “

Did We See it Coming? State Fragility, Climate Vulnerability, and the Uprisings in
Syria and Egypt
,” SAIS Review of International Affairs, Volume 35, Number 1, Winter-Spring
2015, pp. 29-46