贫困的未来：预测到2050年气候变化对全球贫困的影响（英）

11173 Produced by the Research Support TeamAbstractThe Policy Research Working Paper Series disseminates the findings of work in progress to encourage the exchange of ideas about developmentissues. An objective of the series is to get the findings out quickly, even if the presentations are less than fully polished. The papers carry thenames of the authors and should be cited accordingly. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this paper are entirely thoseof the authors. They do not necessarily represent the views of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/World Bank andits affiliated organizations, or those of the Executive Directors of the World Bank or the governments they represent.Policy Research Working Paper11173Climate change is increasingly acknowledged as a criticalissue with far-reaching socioeconomic implications thatextend well beyond environmental concerns. Among themost pressing challenges is its impact on global poverty.This paper projects the potential impacts of unmitigatedclimate change on global poverty rates between 2023 and2050. Building on a study that provided a detailed analysisof how temperature changes affect economic productivity,this paper integrates those findings with binned data from217 countries, sourced from the World Bank’s Poverty andInequality Platform. By simulating poverty rates and thenumber of poor under two climate change scenarios, thepaper uncovers some alarming trends. One of the primaryfindings is that the number of people living in extremepoverty worldwide could be nearly doubled due to climatechange. In all scenarios, Sub-Saharan Africa is projected toThis paper is a product of the Poverty and Equity Global Department. It is part of a larger effort by the World Bank toprovide open access to its research and make a contribution to development policy discussions around the world. PolicyResearch Working Papers are also posted on the Web at http://www.worldbank.org/prwp. The authors may be contactedat pcorralrodas@worldbank.org, jfajardog@worldbank.org, and mnguyen3@worldbank.org. bear the brunt, contributing the largest number of poorpeople, with estimates ranging between 40.5 million and73.5 million by 2050. Another significant finding is thedisproportionate impact of inequality on poverty. Evensmall increases in inequality can lead to substantial rises inpoverty levels. For instance, if every country’s Gini coeffi-cient increases by just 1 percent between 2022 and 2050,an additional 8.8 million people could be pushed below theinternational poverty line by 2050. In a more extreme sce-nario, where every country’s Gini coefficient increases by 10percent between 2022 and 2050, the number of people fall-ing into poverty could rise by an additional 148.8 millionrelative to the baseline scenario. These findings underscorethe urgent need for comprehensive climate policies thatnot only mitigate environmental impacts but also addresssocioeconomic vulnerabilities. The Future of Poverty: Projecting the Impact of ClimateChange on Global Poverty through 2050*Johanna Fajardo-Gonzalez, Minh C. Nguyen, and Paul A. Corral RodasJEL Classification: Q54; I32; O1Keywords: Climate change; temperature; poverty; inequalityThis paper is a product of the Poverty and Equity Global Department. The names of the authors have been ordered using the AmericanEconomic Association Author Randomization Tool, perconfirmation code: d9YfWniXZzwV. Corresponding author: Paul Andres CorralRodas –pcorralrodas@worldbank.org * 1.IntroductionThe average global temperature has increased by more than one degree Celsius since pre-industrialtimes (Masson-Delmotte et al. 2021), with far-reaching implications for human welfare. Substantialevidence indicates that rising temperatures and changing precipitation patterns negatively impacteconomic growth, labor productivity, and agricultural yields, and are expected to disproportionatelyaffect poorer countries (Kotz, Levermann, and Wenz, 2022; Waldhoff et al., 2020; Lee, Villaruel andGaspar, 2016; Burke, Hsiang, and Miguel, 2015; Dell et al., 2014).These climate-related impactshave the potential to derail development progress, especially in settings with limited adaptivecapacity.The relationship between climate change and poverty has been extensively studied, revealing astrong bidirectional link between the two (Onyeaka et al., 2024; Barbier and Hochard, 2018; Seamanet al., 2014; Hope, 2009; Ahmed, Diffenbaugh, and Hertel, 2009). For instance, Hallegatte andRozenberg (2017) highlight how climate change exacerbates poverty by increasing climate variabilityand extreme weather events, which erode people's adaptive capacity and create persistent povertytraps. Their findings build upon Hallegatte et al. (2016), who emphasize that climate shocks—suchas food price spikes, reduced agricultural yields, and increased health risks—pose long-term threatsto poverty reduction efforts. A key finding from Hallegatte and Rozenberg (2017) is t