France's Defender of Rights urges the government to address climate change's impact on children. The organisation outlines several key recommendations in a report released Wednesday to mark United Nations World Children's Day.
"The fact is, while children are the least responsible for environmental damage, they are the most exposed to it and are the first victims", France's Defender of Rights chief Claire Hédon said in the report published on Wednesday.
"These risks are in their immediate environment – their home or place of life – in all the places that welcome them and in outdoor spaces."
The report titled Annual Report on the Rights of the Child 2024, which focuses on children's right to live in a healthy environment, outlines the actions the Defeder's office believes are necessary to ensure this.
To guarantee these rights, Hédon is calling on public authorities to introduce "a legally binding international treaty for the protection of the environment".
On a global scale, "more than 99 percent of children are exposed to a climatic and environmental risk factor" and "a quarter of the deaths of children under five are directly linked to pollution", Hédon said.
The report adds that current policies do not sufficiently take into account the particular vulnerability of children.
"The worsening consequences of the environmental crisis underline the growing burden that future generations will have to bear," it reads.
Hédon has called on public authorities to act in order to "guarantee present children and future generations the satisfaction of their essential needs: breathing, drinking, eating healthily and living in safety".
In all, the report puts forward 20 recommendations, including speeding up the renovation of school buildings and improving all venues that accommodate children.
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Myriad of crises
The Defender of Rights also calls for "rethinking public spaces" to reduce children's exposure to pollution, such as planting trees, expanding pedestrian areas near schools and developing alternative transport.
Another proposition is to adapt the school day and the school holiday calendar to "better take into account climatic changes and their effects on the national scale".
Consultations for prenatal exposure to pesticides should also be accessible to parents, the report said.
In a further push to integrate children's rights into policymaking, Hédon proposed creating "a children’s college within the National Energy Transition Council", or expanding the composition of the Children's Parliament in the National Assembly, made up of several classes each year who are responsible for drafting legislative proposals.
'Myriad of crises'
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The recommendations come as the United Nations agency for children also issued warnings in its annual report, released Tuesday.
"Children are experiencing a myriad of crises, from climate shocks to online dangers, and these are set to intensify in the years to come," Catherine Russell, executive director of Unicef, wrote in a statement.
This year, Unicef has projected forward to 2050 identifying three "major trends" that in addition to unpredictable conflicts that pose threats to children unless policymakers make changes.
The first risk is demographic change, with the number of children expected to remain similar to current figures of 2.3 billion, but they will represent a smaller share of the larger and ageing global population of around 10 billion.
While the proportion of children will decline across all regions, their numbers will explode in some of the poorest areas, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa.
This offers the potential to boost economic growth, but only if the new young population has access to quality education, health care, and jobs, Unicef notes.
The second threat is climate change.
If current greenhouse gas emission trends continue, by 2050 children could face eight times more heatwaves than in 2000, three times more extreme flooding, and 1.7 times more wildfires, Unicef projects.
(with AFP)
