Key findings of the State of the Climate in 2018:
- Record greenhouse gas concentrations are driving global temperatures towards increasingly dangerous levels. Carbon dioxide levels, which were at 357 parts per million kept rising to 405 parts per million in 2017.
- The past four years has witnessed record sea level rise and exceptionally high land and ocean temperatures .
- Extreme weather has continued in early 2019, most recently with Tropical Cyclone Idai, which caused devastating floods and tragic loss of life in Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi.
- The physical signs and socio-economic impacts of climate change are accelerating.
- Hazards: In 2018, most of the natural hazards which affected nearly 62 million people were associated with extreme weather and climate events.
- Food security: In 2017, the number of undernourished people was estimated to have increased to 821 million, partly due to severe droughts associated with the strong El Niño of 2015–2016.
- Displacement: Out of the 17.7 million Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) tracked by the International Organization for Migration, over 2 million people were displaced due to disasters linked to weather and climate events as of September 2018.
