The Climate Hazards Center is an alliance of multidisciplinary scientists and food security analysts from the UC Santa Barbara Geography Department, Africa, and Latin America working alongside partners in the US Geological Survey (USGS), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).
In 1985, in the wake of record famine across east Africa, FEWS NET was created by USGS and USAID to provide advance warning of potential famine events while collecting data to support humanitarian response programs. In 2003, in close collaboration with the US Geological Survey Earth Recources Observation and Science Center (USGS EROS), the Climate Hazards Group (now the Climate Hazards Center) was founded to provide further support to FEWS NET and its goal of protecting the world's most vulnerable regions and inhabitants.
The UC Santa Barbara team conducts critical climate science research, which is shared with CHC field scientists who then communicate information with key decision-makers, often serving as the vital link between climate crisis and timely humanitarian aid.
