Climate Change Funding Neglects Over 1 Billion Youngsters

On Thursday, the Children's Environmental Rights Initiative (CERI), Plan International, Save the Children, and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) released a report showing that global warming puts over 1 billion youngsters at extremely high risk.

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The "Falling Short: Addressing the Climate Finance Gap for Children" report states that only 2.4 percent of key global climate funds can be classified as supporting child-responsive activities despite the fact that children bear the brunt of the climate crisis.

Children's unique physiology, behavioral characteristics and developmental needs, particularly between birth and the age of 5, render them disproportionately vulnerable to impacts such as water and food scarcity, vector- and water-borne diseases, and physical and psychological trauma linked to both extreme weather events and slow-onset processes.

Climate change impacts also disrupt children's access to basic social services that are essential for their development and well-being, such as education, health, safe drinking water, sanitation and hygiene, and child and social protection services.

Climate-related disasters also contribute to increasing the incidence of child labor, child marriage and forced migration, placing children at risk of human trafficking, gender-based violence, abuse and exploitation.

The report used a set of three criteria to assess if climate finance from key multilateral climate funds serving the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and Paris Agreement were supporting child-responsive activities: addressing the distinct and heightened risks children experience from the climate crisis, strengthening the resilience of child-critical social services, and empowering children as agents of change.

Out of all the money given by multilateral climate funds for climate-related projects over a period of 17 years until March 2023, only 2.4 percent, or US$1.2 billion, met all three of the requirements. This number likely reflects an overestimate.

When it comes to children, they are often viewed as a vulnerable group rather than being recognized as active stakeholders or agents of change. Less than 4 percent of projects give explicit and meaningful consideration to the needs and involvement of girls.

The report calls for efforts to scale up child- and gender-responsive climate finance; bolster child-responsive approaches in climate finance policies, strategies, plans and guidance; and increase child-responsive climate finance capacity-building, coordination and partnerships.