Protecting children in
a changing climate
Climate change is endangering children and threatening their futures
Climate change puts children’s most basic rights at risk, seriously affecting their access to health, food, water, clean air, education and protection. Around the world, the growing number of extreme weather events is putting more and more children’s lives in danger. Every year, environmental factors take the lives of 1.7 million children under five.
For an even greater number of children, these events mean a reduced chance of a happy, healthy future. When floods hit, schools and health clinics are destroyed. When droughts occur, children spend less time in school because they have to walk miles to collect water. Rising sea levels and toxic air pollution turn children’s communities into hazardous environments to grow up in.
These aren’t problems that can wait. They are problems right now, and UNICEF is working tirelessly to help solve them.
Mozambique, 2019. Helcio holds Anderson as they take shelter in a living space for people displaced by Cyclone Idai. The cyclone caused widespread flooding, forcing thousands of people from their homes.
UNICEF/De Wet
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600 million children – one in four worldwide – will be living in areas with extremely limited water resources by 2040
Protecting and empowering children in the face of climate change
Solving these problems is central to UNICEF’s mission to realise the rights of every child – especially the most vulnerable. We respond rapidly to natural disasters, providing children with the care, supplies and protection that could save their lives. We are committed to providing a safe environment for every child to grow up in.
But children deserve more than protection. With the right support they can be empowered to become agents of change who can shape their own future. That’s why UNICEF is providing communities with access to green technologies and promoting the use of sustainable energy.
UNICEF UK’S Youth Advisory Board’s Message to World Leaders at COP26
UNICEF UK’S Youth Advisory Board, along with 25 Ambassadors and supporters want world leaders to hear them loud and clear. The climate crisis is a child rights crisis.
As COP26 kicks off on 31st October 2021, our Youth Advisory Board have written an open letter to world leaders as they enter critical negotiations on the climate crisis. The letter, published in The Times on 1st November 2021 asks leaders, including Prime Minister Boris Johnson, to listen to the voices of children, and to take their words with them into the Conference.
Co-signed by UK Ambassadors and High Profile Supporters, including Orlando Bloom, Olivia Colman and David Harewood they declare the climate crisis a child rights crisis and request leaders to add their name to the Intergovernmental Declaration on Children, Youth and Climate Action.
Join our campaigners and add your name to the petition asking the UK Government to sign the Intergovernmental Declaration on Children, Youth and Climate Action and put children at the heart of climate action.
The Youth Advisory Board's open letter to world leaders, published in The Times on 1st November 2021.
Help us build a more sustainable future for children
Donate nowGiving children a voice in the fight for their environment
Children everywhere deserve to have a say in their future and we’re fighting for their right to be heard. In the UK we’ve campaigned for children’s right to breathe clean air, pressuring the government to reduce toxic air levels. In Zambia, child-led advocacy programme Unite4Climate is empowering children to become climate ambassadors. And in places like Za’atari Refugee camp in Jordan ‘Start-up’ events are equipping children with the skills they need to design innovative solutions to the challenges they face.
UNICEF fights to make sure children’s voices are central to high-level discussions about climate and the environment. We use our unrivalled influence to work with governments in 190 countries striving to ensure that they stick to their climate and environment goals and help them to develop even more ambitious programmes that better protect children.
Support UNICEF and help us build a more sustainable future for children
By supporting UNICEF you can help protect children from the effects of climate change, fight for their voices to be heard and build a sustainable future.
