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Urban areas are at high risk of climate change. The impact of extreme weather caused by climate change on different social groups is drawing increasing concerns. This paper focuses on the urban distressed migrant population who is marginalized in terms of society, economy and region. Social survey methods such as questionnaires, focus groups, and case interviews are used to collect data. Supported by the Beijing Social Work Development Center for Facilitators, a non-governmental social work organization, and their network branches in three Chinese megacities, a survey of climate change impacts and adaptation needs was carried out in areas with high concentrations of migrant population. On the basis of the study, this paper gives the connotation and identification criteria of the “distressed migrant population”, and analyzes the concrete influence of climate change, especially the extreme weather, on this population and their families. The survey shows that the frequent occurrence of extreme weather further exacerbates the survival pressure on the distressed migrant population, plunging them into a “climate poverty” trap, and creating urgent needs for adaptation, which are mainly manifested in two aspects: The first is a strong desire to reduce their living distress and climate vulnerability, including improving the living environment, health status, career development ability; the second is a strong desire to improve their resilience, including access to climate information, psychological stress relief, and social support. This paper concludes with policy implications on how to improve the adaptive capacity of the distressed migrant population from three aspects: material demand, community support and self-empowerment. This paper intends to raise attention to urban climate poverty groups and promote policy support.

Western China is typically sensitive to climate change and ecologically fragile. It also has large numbers of people living in poverty, and it is a hot spot for emigration. This paper takes the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region (NHAR) as a case and, employing a mixed-method research combining exploratory research and confirmatory research where quantitative analysis and qualitative analysis are made, conducts an empirical study on the dynamics of climate change impacts on migration. Firstly, this paper identified the fragile characteristics of different types of migrant groups (including policy-facilitated migrants, voluntary migrants and economic migrants) in the context of climate change; secondly, based on confirmatory factor analysis, this paper conducted climate change vulnerability assessment at county level, and explored several common potential factors affecting the regional fragility of climate change in Ningxia, include: climate capacity, social and economic development level, human capital, transportation infrastructure, and education level, etc. The result shows that the climate capacity factor accounts for 37.5% of contribution to regional climate change vulnerability. This paper justified that lacking climate capacity in long-term climate change is the major driving factor of climate-induced poverty and migration in the middle and south Ningxia. Based on a DPISR model, this paper developed a theoretical framework with its core concept “climate capacity”. Within this analytical framework, a series of indicators on climate capacity and climate-induced poverty were suggested to assess climate change related migration risks, which can support local migration planning in Ningxia and other western China areas.