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Climate Shocks and Migration: An Agent-Based Modeling Approach
Barbara Entwisle1, Nathalie E Williams2, Ashton M Verdery3
1Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA; Carolina Population Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA; Department of Sociology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA.
Population and Environment
|September 6, 2016
Summary
Climate shocks have minimal impact on migration. Agent-based models show that established migration patterns and selection factors, not climate change, drive movement decisions in rural Thailand.
Area of Science:
- Demography
- Environmental Science
- Agricultural Economics
Background:
- Climate shocks, such as extreme rainfall variability, can impact agricultural systems and land use.
- Demographic behaviors like migration, marriage, and births are dynamically linked to agricultural outcomes.
- Understanding these linkages is crucial for predicting population responses to environmental changes.
Purpose of the Study:
- To construct and utilize an agent-based model to simulate migration patterns in response to climate shocks.
- To investigate the influence of different weather regimes on migration in a rice-based economy.
- To identify the key factors determining migration responses to climate variability.
Main Methods:
- Development of an agent-based model with empirically derived rules from Nang Rong district, Northeast Thailand.
- Simulation of migration patterns under four distinct weather scenarios: normal, wet, dry, and highly variable.
- Integration of dynamic linkages between demographic behaviors, agriculture, land use, and rainfall patterns.
Main Results:
- Simulations indicate a relatively small impact of climate shocks on overall migration rates.
- Existing high baseline migration rates and strong selection factors significantly influence population movement.
- These established migration drivers appear to overshadow the effects of climate variability.
Conclusions:
- Climate change may have a limited direct effect on migration decisions in this context.
- Socio-economic factors and pre-existing migration dynamics are dominant drivers of population mobility.
- Further research should explore the interplay between climate and socio-economic factors on migration.
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