Climate funding commitments for children not being met: UNICEF

By Firdevs Bulut Kartal

TORONTO (AA) - In a new report, UNICEF reported that sufficient resources are not being allocated for the needs of children despite this being a vital part of climate fund commitments.

Although children bear the brunt of the climate crisis, the latest report from UNICEF's Children's Environmental Rights Initiative (CERI) highlights the lack of meeting commitments on climate funding.

Pointing out that only 2.4% of key global funds support activities for children, the report stated that over 1 billion children are at "extremely high risk" from the effects of the climate crisis.

"The unique physiology, behavioral characteristics, and developmental needs of children, particularly between birth and five years old," make them vulnerable to impacts such as water and food shortages and physical and psychological trauma associated with the weather, it said.

Climate-related disasters also exacerbate child labor, child marriage, and forced migration, exposing children to the risk of human trafficking, gender-based violence, abuse, and exploitation, it reported.

Officials of the rights initiative urged multilateral climate funds and other financiers providing financial support, domestic and worldwide, to act quickly and address the lack of compliance.

The report underlined the need to "prioritize investments to strengthen the climate resilience of child-critical social services through child-responsive interventions, including in education, health, food and nutrition, clean energy, water, sanitation and hygiene, child and social protection services, and through disaster risk reduction."