Climate change is a significant and lasting shift in temperatures, precipitation, and ecological patterns caused primarily by human activities that alter the composition of the atmosphere, including burning of fossil fuels, deforestation, and agricultural production. Such changes to the climate system manifest in a multitude of ways, including sea level rise, acidification of ocean and freshwater bodies, altered wind and precipitation patterns, ecosystem transformation, and extinction of species. Human-induced climate change is an urgent global issue affecting the livelihoods of the people, societies, and economies worldwide.

See also: global change, climate justice, global south, global north, human right