In response to the recent Amazon fires burning at a record rate and Macron's recent statement to block the EU trade agreement with Brazil at the G7 meeting, Katia Maia Oxfam Brazil Executive Director said we welcome Macron's warning to the Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro to take firm and immediate actions to save the Amazon forests, but warnings alone do not end fires. But the G7 countries, who are historically responsible for causing the climate crisis, have equal responsibility and must too take action.

Responding to the final communiqué of the COP25 climate talks in Madrid, Chema Vera, Interim Executive Director of Oxfam International, said: “The world is screaming out for climate action but this summit has responded with a whisper. The poorest nations are in a sprint for survival yet many governments have barely moved from the starting blocks."

Climate fuelled disasters were the number one driver of internal displacement over the last decade, forcing more than 20 million people a year – one person every two seconds - to leave their homes, said Oxfam today. The contentious issue of financial support for communities, including displaced communities, which have suffered loss and damage as a result of the climate crisis is expected to take centre stage at the UN Climate Summit in Madrid from 2 – 13 December 2019.

More than 52 million people in 18 countries across southern, eastern and central Africa are facing up to crisis levels of hunger as a result of weather extremes, compounded by poverty and conflict.

 

The United States’ withdrawal from the Paris Agreement is an indefensible, pointless and morally bankrupt capitulation that will only serve to weaken the global effort to combat the climate crisis, Oxfam said.

As world leaders gather in New York this week for the Climate Action Summit, Oxfam partner Jose Mucote decided to come all the way from Mozambique to share his experiences as a first responder to the devastating Cyclone Idai earlier this year, a cyclone that is a true witness of a climate crisis we can no longer ignore.

New figures released by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) show that the number of hungry people has risen for the third year in a row, mainly as a result of conflict and the climate crisis. However, despite the spiralling hunger and two global food price crises in a little over ten years, hunger has fallen off the political agenda.