“The only international language that the world understands,” he said Eglantyne Jebb, founder of Save the Children, “it is the cry of children”and there is increasing evidence confirming that children are not only the innocent victims of conflicts who must be listened to, but also the most vulnerable victims of climate change.
The climate crisis is an educational crisis. Here and now, The climate crisis is depriving millions of children and adolescents of their right to learn, play and feel safe..
In Pakistan, serious flooding have destroyed or damaged more than 26,000 schools in the last year. This has exposed more than 600,000 teenage girls to a higher risk of dropping out of school, gender violence and child marriage. In Ethiopia, girls like Mellion They are hungry and at risk of dropping out of school forever as a result of the current drought.
Although the climate crisis threatens the rights of everyone on the planet, those who suffer the brunt of its impact are the most vulnerable children, who already live in environments of prolonged crisis due to armed conflicts, forced displacements and other crises. For these children and their communities, climate change is already a terrifying reality that can mean the difference between life and death, war and peace, and the possibility of learning or not.
Right now, all over the world there are 224 million childhoods affected by crises who urgently need educational support. New analyzes by Education Can’t Wait (ECWfor its acronym in English), the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises, sponsored by UNICEF, has found that, since 2020, 62 million of these children have suffered the effects of climate-related hazards such as droughts, floods, cyclones and other extreme weather events. That figure is close to the total populations of several G7 countries, such as the United Kingdom, France or Italy.
Although these childhoods are the ones that have contributed the least to climate change, they are the ones that have the most to lose. During the last decade, 31 million school-age boys and girls have been displaced by the climate crisiswith 13 million in just the last three years.
The climate crisis represents a real and present threat to global security, economic prosperity and the very basis of our societies. According to the World Bank, by 2050 the impacts of climate change could cost the global economy US$7.9 trillion and force the displacement of 216 million people within their own countries by 2050.
The severity and intensity of cyclones, typhoons, floods and droughts continues to increase. The number of disasters caused, in part, by climate change has increased five-fold in the last 50 years. Climate-related hazards have a direct impact on the number of displacements, but they also promote disputes over scarce resources and pose a threat to the fragile peace in many parts of the world.. More than 70% of refugees and internally displaced people due to conflict and violence come from areas affected by climate change.
Together, these interrelated crises of climate change, displacement and conflict are having a serious impact on the educational opportunities of millions of children and adolescents around the world.
Ahead of this year’s climate change negotiations in Dubai (COP28) and the Global Refugee Forum in Geneva, we must establishr a link between climate action and educational actionwhich is our investment in our population, our planet and our future.
To meet this challenge, ECW calls on donors, the private sector and other key partners to urgently mobilize 150 million dollars in additional resources. This is a significant contribution to ECW’s overall resource mobilization target of US$1.5 trillion for its 2023-2026 strategic plan.
We all know that education has a good return on investment. Long-term investments in human capital, including education, vocational training, and overall health and well-being, offer 10 times greater performance that of investments in physical capital. By investing in education today, we are investing in the economic and social prosperity of tomorrow, in an end to displacement and hunger, in a better world and in the future of childhood.
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The climate crisis threatens to end human civilization as we know it today. Now is the time to address this issue head-on, and education plays a key role. By continuing the learning of the most vulnerable children, and linking quality education with climate action, we can equip an entire generation of climate stewards with the skills necessary to adapt to the changes that will occur in the environment. environment and pave the way towards a better future.
In the eye of the storm, we call on new and existing donors to support us. We ask you to act, here and now. Do you accept the challenge?