Sept. 8 (UPI) — Nearly 6 million children and young people in Latin America will fall into poverty by 2030 because of climate change’s impact on their communities, a recent report predicts.
However, that situation would become far worse if governments don’t take swift action to limit greenhouse gas emissions and adopt strategies to reduce climate-related losses.
If mitigation measures are too few or delayed, the number of affected children could triple to 17.9 million, according to a report by the United Nations Children’s Fund, or UNICEF, and the U.N. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, or ECLAC, titled “The Impact of Climate Change on Child and Youth Poverty in Latin America.”
“Children and adolescents bear the greatest burden of climate change. Not only are their developing bodies more vulnerable to extreme events such as cyclones or heat waves, but these events also disrupt their families’ livelihoods and their education,” said Roberto Benes, UNICEF’s regional director for Latin America and the Caribbean.