ANALYSIS: Does climate change fuel terrorism in the Sahel?

Climate change does not directly lead to more terrorism in the Central Sahel. Rather, factors associated with climate change appear to be a catalyst for localised conflicts, mainly driven by disruptions in agricultural production patterns and resource scarcity. Also, local conflict offers fertile ground for the establishment of terror groups.

This is the conclusion of a research project conducted by the Institute for Security Studies (ISS). The study was carried out in response to the United Nations Secretary-General’s 2023 call for “further evidence-based and context-specific research and analysis on the nexus between climate change and terrorism, as well as its programming implications.”

The link between climate change and terrorism has long been a hot debate among analysts and policymakers concerned with Africa’s human security. The Central Sahel – affected by both threats – is an ideal place (along with the Lake Chad Basin and Somalia) to observe these interrelationships.

Average temperatures in the Sahel rose by 0.6°C to 0.8°C between 1970 and 2010, and long-term projections point to an increase of between 3°C and 6°C by the end of the 21st century. These trends are already reflected in a marked variability in precipitation, a rise in extreme weather events with more frequent floods and droughts, and soil degradation.

The Sahel is also grappling with a multidimensional security crisis that began in Mali in 2012 and spread to Burkina Faso and Niger in 2015. All three countries face a proliferation and expansion of armed groups, including terror groups like Jama’at Nusrat ul-Islam wa al-Muslimin and Islamic State in the Sahel, and various rebel and self-defence groups.

ISS research sites in Niger and Burkina Faso

In 2024, the ISS conducted surveys in Niger’s Tillabéri region, which is heavily affected by climate change and insecurity linked to violent extremism. Burkina Faso’s Fada N’Gourma department was selected for the same reasons. Mali was not included in the primary research, due to the large amount of existing literature on the subject.

Participants included farmers, herders, hunters, agro-pastoralists, internally displaced people, and institutional players (government services, international and non-governmental organisations, and religious and traditional authorities).

The data shows that although respondents don’t refer to ‘climate change’ in their local languages, participants recognised its impact on their activities. However, this is not a new phenomenon, as extreme climate and environmental events such as droughts and locust invasions – which have led to famine – remain engraved in the collective memory.

Since the 1970s, local populations have felt the effects of climate change through changes in the cropping calendar. It is marked especially by the late start and early end of the rainy and agricultural seasons, intensified droughts, and the multiplication of extreme climatic events such as heat peaks, flooding (including of arable land) and violent winds.

The research did not reveal any direct link between climate change and terror activities carried out by violent extremist groups. Rather, climate change sparks localised intercommunal conflict, triggered by disrupted agricultural production patterns and natural resource scarcity, which causes groups and communities to compete for access and control of resources.

In both Tillabéri and Fada N’Gourma, the impact of climatic variations on agricultural and pastoral production systems disproportionately threatens the livelihoods of rural populations, who rely on subsistence farming and livestock breeding.

Mobility, having always been the ‘cornerstone of local communities’ resilience in the face of environmental challenges,’ access to land, water and pasture, thus becomes a major factor in the future.

The research revealed various conflict triggers. They include the early transhumance of livestock, the lack of marking of transhumance corridors, the non-observance of field release dates, farmers’ clearing and development of grazing areas, cattle tracks and transhumance corridors. Other triggers include the private appropriation of water points, and monopolisation of pastoral areas by large landowners, agribusiness players, hunting concessionaires and mining companies.

Climate change impacts combine with governance problems, particularly the management of agro-pastoral zones, obsolete production methods and land pressure exacerbated by population growth. Governments’ public policies, aimed at ensuring food security for their populations following the droughts of the 1970s, saw agriculture being prioritised over pastoralism.

In cases where being either a sedentary farmer or nomadic herder overlaps with ethnic identities, conflicts can become communalised. As a result, self-defence militias emerge, leading to greater violence and atrocities.

The deteriorating security situation since 2012 and the circulation of light weapons aggravate the problem. ISS research in West Africa, some carried out as early as 2016, found that people joined insurgencies to protect themselves, their family, community or income-generating activities from local security threats.

What do these research findings on the links between climate change and terrorism mean for programming and policy?

Overall, responses must avoid linking terrorism and global warming in the Sahel as a means to mobilise international donors or accelerate the international climate agenda.

Climate-related challenges in the region are more accurately defined in terms of natural resource scarcity and destabilised production systems. That in turn leads to local conflict, against the backdrop of weakening conflict management by both traditional and state systems.

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The research findings reassert the need for an integrated approach to combatting terrorism and local conflict, reflecting the complexity of the contexts in which they occur.

Given the indirect links between climate change and insecurity, both challenges must be addressed in an integrated way. The intermediary factors through which climate change ultimately contributes to terrorism must be targeted, as well as the way these factors interact and reinforce each other.

In particular, the production potential of agricultural and pastoral economies in the Sahel must be strengthened by integrating innovative and resilient technical solutions to the adverse effects of climate change.

Similarly, improving local and institutional mechanisms for managing resources and community tensions is vital to reducing the scope for terrorist groups to exploit vulnerabilities.

Djiby Sow, Senior Researcher and Fahiraman Rodrigue Kone, Sahel Project Manager, Institute for Security Studies (ISS) Office for West Africa and the Sahel

(This article was first published by ISS Today, a Premium Times syndication partner. We have their permission to republish).