By 2080, in Africa, an increase from 5 to 8 per cent in arid and semi-arid land is projected under a range of climate scenarios. While identifying particularly vulnerable groups globally and at country level remains challenging, it is particularly important for policymaking directed towards building climate resilience. People living in low-lying coastal areas, drylands, and mountainous and remote areas and population groups whose livelihoods rely on forest products are particularly at risk. Yet, basic information on population size, socioeconomic characteristics and risk factors which could help identify those groups remains in the form of very rough approximations. Some of those groups are difficult to reach owing to their geographical location, but the lack of basic information is also associated with an insufficiency in the resources for producing statistics at the level of disaggregation required to identify specific population groups.