Digital collage featuring climate activists Jessy and Isaac created for Oxfam by Nigerian visual artist Alexis Chivir-Ter Tsegba.

An art montage featuring Jessy and Isaac, two young climate activists from Malawi.
An art montage featuring Jessy and Isaac, two young climate activists from Malawi.

Our planet and its people

Tackling climate change

Climate change is being felt most by people in countries that have done the least to cause the crisis.

A more equal world is possible. One where any of us at risk from the climate crisis have what we need to survive extreme weather and build sustainable futures for generations to come.

Communities calling for system change not climate change

  • Two women stand in a hot, dusty internally displaced persons camp with tents in the background. They are both over 40 and one wears a yellow hijab and the other a red hijab.

    Community led response to climate change

    "I do this work because I can sympathise with those affected by drought and other disasters." Ibaado Mohamed works with Oxfam to provide life-saving support for internally displaced people in Somalia.

  • Ali Shire Omar is in a greenhouse looking at green tomatoes.

    Communities are adapting to climate change, today and tomorrow

    "I personally believe it is a win for the community." Ali Shire Omar is growing food in Somalia with support from Oxfam.

  • A woman in Nigeria holding a placard with lungs made of trees calling on people to plant trees as they are the lungs of the earth.

    Together we are holding the most powerful to account over climate change

    "The change we need in our world begins with you and me, I feel like if I contribute the little I can, someone else will take the step and continue." Nimotallahi Lawal, a volunteer at the caravan climate change walk in Nigeria.

The front page Image: Max van Woerkom/ Oxfam

The richest 1% emit as much planet-heating pollution as two-thirds of humanity says Oxfam's report Climate Equality: A Planet for the 99%, published ahead of the UN Climate Summit, COP28.

Read the blog

What are the effects of climate change?

A view from above of flooding in Balochistan in Pakistan. Image: Arif Shah/Oxfam

A view from above of flooding in Balochistan in Pakistan

Extreme weather is destroying homes and wrecking lives. And it’s hitting the people who have done the least to cause the climate crisis. When disaster strikes, communities respond fast with the support of our partners, combatting the effects of weather events like floods and droughts, to save lives.

How can we respond to climate change together?

Seeds at a seedbank in Zimbabwe. Image: Shepherd Tozvireva/ Oxfam Novib

A pair of hands hold seeds

Innovations like drought-resistant seeds, reinforced homes, and training on how to grow new crops mean the people most at risk from the effects of climate change can carry on living, earning and learning, whatever the future brings.

How do we call for climate action together?

Mya-Rose Craig, Founder and President of charity Black2Nature, author of Birdgirl. Image: Nic Kane / Oxfam

19-year-old British-Bangladeshi Mya-Rose who has long straight hair holds a green sign to the camera that says 'change the climate of greed'

Governments and companies have promised to tackle the climate crisis and protect the people it hits hardest. We support people facing the climate crisis to get the support they need to stop climate change from destroying their futures. And help hold the people in power to account.

Image: Rob Rickman/Oxfam

With the Make the Polluter Pay campaign – I hope to be able to hold rich, industrialised countries and companies accountable... to see funds flow to frontline communities so they can reshape their present and future.”

Lagi Seru, a climate activist based in Fiji  and co-founder of the Alliance for Future Generations.

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The right to a fairer, liveable future

To help tackle climate change, we're calling on governments to take bold action. That means urgently reducing emissions and significantly increasing finance to help communities around the world combat the effects of a changing climate.

Every day, together with volunteers and local partners, we support communities to stand up and speak out for their right to a fairer, liveable future.

Irrigation for the future

In Zimbabwe, the changing climate means farmers' crops are threatened by floods and droughts.

In Nyanyadzi, Oxfam and its partners have helped the farmers build gabions, which act as silt traps, to restore the irrigation system and protect their harvest.

How your donations have helped support people impacted by climate change

  • Oxfam GB has directly reached 200,000 people through programmes related to climate justice.
  • In Pakistan, we are supporting farmers to reclaim fields damaged by salt water. And helping them get fresh water for their fields and for household use.
  • We are working in nine cities across four Asian countries supporting urban communities to combat climate change.
  • Cyclone Amphan hit areas of Bangladesh and India in 2020. Local partners were able to prepare by disinfecting cyclone shelters, and continuing efforts to stop the spread of disease.
  • Super Typhoon Rai hit the Philippines in 2021. Oxfam staff, partners and communities got 72,000 people access to food, water, hygiene kits, shelter, solar lights, and other essentials.

Khadija Farah/Oxfam

The drought has ravaged the lives of many people... we have lost almost all our livestock that was the backbone of each and every community living here.”

Sowda, near Wajir, Kenya

Stories of hope

A Changing Climate

0.1%

Kenya, Ethiopia, Somalia and South Sudan produce 0.1% of global emissions.

52%

The richest 10 percent of the world's population accounted for over half of the emissions added to the atmosphere between 1990 and 2015.

8x

The money needed to help people affected by extreme weather-related emergencies like floods or drought is eight times higher than 20 years ago.

Climate change statistics sources

  • In the Footing the Bill report, Oxfam said that low-income countries are hardest hit by climate change but have contributed very little: Africa’s current emissions are less than 4% of the global total, (despite being home to 17% of the world’s population). Kenya, Ethiopia, Somalia and South Sudan are together responsible for a mere 0.1% of global emissions.
  • In the Confronting Carbon Inequality report, Oxfam and the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) estimate that from 1990 to 2015 - the richest 10% of the world’s population (around 630 million people) were responsible for 52% of the cumulative carbon emissions.
  • Also in the Footing the Bill report, Oxfam estimates that funding needs for UN humanitarian appeals linked to extreme weather are eight times higher than they were 20 years ago. And over the past five years, nearly half of appeal requirements have gone unmet.

Over-relying on planting trees and as-yet-unproven technology instead of genuinely shifting away from fossil fuel-dependent economies is a dangerous folly. We are already seeing the devastating consequences of climate delay.”

Nafkote Dabi, Climate Change Lead, Oxfam International

Fighting for climate justice

Let's take action now!”

Climate activist Jessy in Malawi

Call for climate justice