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Push and pull migration The growth of the cities throws ample opportunity for the work force skilled unskilled to
get absorbed in the urban market. Here both the factors of push and pull migration have to be in play to fill in the demand of workforce at all levels. As per the Census 2001 figures, almost
309 million migrated in the country which accounts for almost 30 percent of the population of the country. The cities with high potential of churning out jobs e.g. Delhi, Mumbai, Pune,
Bangalore, Surat, Ahmedabad, Indore, continue to remain the favorite destination for years for inter as well intra state migrants. The result being sheer mismatch in the quantum of the
possibility offered on account of pull migration and the resources available through push migration; the possibility of later outnumbering the former being more. Lack of potential of
other cities to develop as mega centers is hindered due to many reasons like lack of matching fund, revenue deficit, lack of municipal sector reforms, lack of avenues for the industry and
the service sector to find incessant supply of resources esp. water, electricity, human resources. A gradual shift in the migration pattern from big cities to smaller towns due to
high cost of living in the cities is also being noticed Kundu, 1997.
Most of the cities face migration mostly from the nearby areas falling within the state or even outside depending upon the availability of the jobs, skill set, geographical distance,
acceptability, history of migration etc. The reasons are varied, ranging from the difficult topography of the native place, average land holding size 0.4 ha for marginal farmers and
1.41ha for small farmers MOA, 2005, net sown area, and total irrigated land. Issue of less per capita land availability combined with untimely rainfalls, lack of access to irrigation
facilities, water scarcity due to overexploitation of ground water, land degradation and decreasing productivity marginal lands in particular, have taken a toll on the rural populace.
All India average for the land holding by small and the marginal farmers accounts for almost 38.9 percent of the total land holding in the country, in case of Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh
it is 25.4 percent and 25.8 percent respectively ibid. Moreover, the growth in the population does not transcend into more or even constant amount of land availability for the next
generation. Availability of work through National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme NREGS has been able to curtail the migration to some extent, but still not rewarding to
completely stop the trend of migration.
2.7 Climate change risks – Indian urban context
Large sections of the urban poor are exposed to a range of environmental health hazards in their homes and workplaces plus a set of stressors e.g. urban heat-island effect and human-
induced water scarcity – and climate change is likely to bring a range of new risks or heightened risk levels for already existing hazards and stressors – for instance in many cities
through more frequent or severe storms, more extreme rainfall episodes, heat waves, constraints on freshwater supplies and, for coastal cities, sea-level rise de Sherbinin et al.,
2007. There are also complex relationships between this mix of hazards and the many inter- related components of urban poverty which include not only the urban poor’s inadequate
incomes and limited asset bases but also very poor-quality housing, lack of basic infrastructure for providing water, sanitation, drainage and garbage removal and lack of civil
and political rights. This greatly increases the vulnerability of the urban poor to most environmental hazards, including most of those related to climate change Satterthwaite et al.,
2007. This complex interplay is well understood in
Judith Rodin statement
“…communities around the world need better weapons - new tools, techniques, and strategies - if they hope
to tame the three-headed hydra of climate risk, poverty, and precipitous urbanization” PND, 2009. Since it may be too late to stop the global warming that’s already occurred, we
also must figure out how to survive it....there is far less attention paid to adaptation, what
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needs to be done to help people and environments cope with what’s already occurred and with what’s coming.” This is represented in the graphic below Fig. 1. The star in the
centre determines the zone of intervention.
FIG. 1 : PEOPLE AND ENVIRONMENTS: ZONE OF INTERVENTION
Source: based on discussion with Jo da Silva ACCCRN, Hue Meeting, Sept 2009
The increased climate variability and change are likely to differentially impact the poorer and disadvantage groups. The increased level of risk can be due to increase in flooding events,
scant availability of water supplies, increase in cost of food supplies or water, service deficiency of basic infrastructure, damage caused due to physical assets and livelihoods due
to hydro-meteorological phenomena and poor adaptive capacity of individualsfamilies and the communities. In general, the people most at risk from climate change are those living in
affected areas that are:
inability to avoid the direct or indirect impacts e.g. by lack of good-quality houses and drainage systems that prevent flooding;
likely to be most affected e.g. for instance infants and older groups who are less able to cope with heat waves;
least able to cope with the illness, injury, premature death or loss of income, livelihood or assets caused by the kinds of impacts Satterthwaite et al., 2007 e.g.
Households with uncertain incomes prone to disaster related losses. Good governance bridges the disparities between income groups and risk-prone groups. For
instance, by proving basic services such as piped water supply, sanitation, electricity, safe housing to socially disadvantage groups, the exposure to the hazard risks is considerably
minimized. Socially progressive schemes either through the federalstateULB funds will reduce the vulnerability of the poor and enhance city wide planning. The quality of
government at city and higher levels influences the levels of risk from climate change facing those with limited incomes or assets in several ways:
quality and provision for infrastructure for all areas which should limit risks of flooding for the whole city area, not just for the wealthier areas;
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quality of provision for disaster-preparedness including warnings, measures taken to limit damage and, if needed, good provision to help people move to safer areas
quickly; quality of planning for and coordinating disaster-response for instance rescue
services and appropriate emergency and health care services and reconstruction to help those who have lost their homes and livelihoods which should aim to improve
resilience, but seldom achieves this;
extent to which poorer groups can buy, build or rent “safe” housing in “safe” sites; degree to which local government creates an enabling environment for local civil-
society action to contribute towards addressing the practical aims identified above Satterthwaite et al., 2007.
2.8 Upgrading slums and squatter settlements
