A boy walks from school to his house in Aberao village in South Tarawa, Kiribati. Kiribati is one of the countries most affected by sea level rise. During high tide many villages become inundated making large parts of the villages uninhabitable.

Children's Climate Emergency

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Climate change is the biggest threat facing kids today.

From Aotearoa and the Pacific, to the farthest reaches of our planet – 1 billion children are facing increasingly frequent and more extreme climate emergencies. From cyclones to heatwaves, flooding to drought – an ever-growing number of kids are in danger. 

A staggering 90% of the world’s disasters are climate related. When a school is wiped out by floods, or a cyclone destroys a community health clinic, or drought kills a family’s crops – it’s children who are impacted the most. Every climate emergency further reduces their chances of a happy, healthy childhood. 

This is not the future, this is the now. Climate change is here, we have to act. 

You can support our work protecting kids against the effects of climate change. Donate now. 

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Water and Sanitation

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you could give 10 collapsible water containers for families displaced after a climate emergency.

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A video about Climate Change told by Vanessa Nakate a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador in Kenya.

What’s UNICEF doing to protect children against the climate crisis?  

We’re focused on creating sustainable, long-term solutions to the biggest climate induced threats children are facing. By harnessing the power of innovation and adopting ground-breaking technology, we’re tackling urgent issues such as water scarcity, climate resiliency and food insecurity caused by climate change. 

In 2022, we built 1,855 solar water systems to provide safe water to communities, health-care facilities and schools – resulting in 5.4 million people gaining access to clean water and 3.2 million people to climate-resilient sanitation facilities. We’re also using the power of the sun to provide non-stop education for kids and aid women to grow climate resilient crops in Zambia.

“I really appreciate the knowledge I have been taught in both growing and preparing meals for the family.” says Kamana Mundia.

She's part of the Scaling up Nutrition project which is teaching women how to farm their land using locally occurring crops. This will have major nutrition benefits for her and her family.

Kamana Mundia is part of the Scaling up Nutrition project which is teaching women how to farm their land using locally occurring crops.“ I really appreciate the knowledge I have been taught in both growing and preparing meals for the family.” says Kamana.
Decorative Yellow wavy stroke on bottom right
  • After washing his face and hands, Reshma feeds her son Azaan Ali therapeutic food that she received from UNICEF's mobile clinic at Ismail Bhand village, Pakistan. Little Azaan has been diagnosed with Severe Acute Malnutrition (SAM) by a doctor at the clinic.
    Mobile life-saving teams

    Malnutrition was already a big problem in Pakistan, however, last year the catastrophic floods made it worst. This climate disaster destroyed food sources and displaced an estimated 8 million people. UNICEF responded through our mobile health and nutrition teams to reach vulnerable kids like Azaan (16 months) and provide them with ready-to-eat therapeutic food and medicines. 

  • Mike studies in grade 12 at Katiula Combined School, in Katete, Zambia. “We used to bring our own torches to schools for evening classes, but the light was never enough and only lit the corners of the classroom,”
    The power of the sun

    To give vulnerable kids in parts of Zambia a safe, comfortable and enabling learning environment, UNICEF has installed solar panels in 19 schools, supporting more than 6,000 students. Not only did it  bring electricity to the school, but also many young learners from marginalised communities back to class. 

  • After washing his face and hands, Reshma feeds her son Azaan Ali therapeutic food that she received from UNICEF's mobile clinic at Ismail Bhand village, Pakistan. Little Azaan has been diagnosed with Severe Acute Malnutrition (SAM) by a doctor at the clinic.
    Mobile life-saving teams

    Malnutrition was already a big problem in Pakistan, however, last year the catastrophic floods made it worst. This climate disaster destroyed food sources and displaced an estimated 8 million people. UNICEF responded through our mobile health and nutrition teams to reach vulnerable kids like Azaan (16 months) and provide them with ready-to-eat therapeutic food and medicines. 

How will my donation help children impacted by climate change? 

By making a donation today, you’ll be helping us respond when the next cyclone, drought or other climate-related disaster strikes, while also fuelling our ongoing work to bring long-term, sustainable solutions for 1 billion children living in a climate crisis. 

When children caught in the next climate emergency need our help, your support means we'll have pre-positioned supplies stockpiled and ready to go. When families need health, water, nutrition, shelter and emergency supplies, our amazing logistics network can deliver anywhere in the world within 48 hours. 

Just recently, when Libya was struck by devastating Storm Daniel, we airlifted 30 tonnes of emergency supplies to distribute to families affected. And last year when 33 million people in Pakistan were impacted by catastrophic flooding, we raced to support kids and communities who’d lost everything.  

While we’re quick to respond to climate emergencies, we’re not quick to leave. Your donation ensures we can stay and deliver for as long as kids need us. You’re helping us build back better by restoring damaged infrastructure, strengthening climate resilience against future disasters and creating local solutions to mitigate the effects of climate change right now. 

We promise to maximise every dollar received into helping the 1 billion children, their families and their communities threatened by this climate crisis now, and for the future. 

A young boy plays with a plastic ball in the village of Ampotaka, Madagascar.

A young boy plays with a plastic ball in the village of Ampotaka, Madagascar.

His community has experienced several years of back-to-back droughts which wiped out crops and hampered access to food. When the water dries out, families are forced to travel 20km by ox wagon to fill up jerry cans with clean water.

To support the people of Ampotaka, UNICEF has built an artificial underwater aquifer so the village can store up to four months worth of water. This helps families survive the dry season and means children can spend their time playing and learning, instead of collecting water for their families. 

How else can I help protect kids against the effects of climate change? 

Sign our petition
You can help make real climate action for kids, right now. This petition is about calling on our Government to commit to ensuring 1 billion kids, in Aotearoa, the Pacific and around the world, have climate resilient social systems and infrastructure so they can live in this new era and access their basic rights – housing, health, food, water, education and protection from extreme weather emergencies. Sign our petition.

By standing together, we can push the government of Aotearoa to take stronger climate action right now.

Share this appeal 
Help us spread awareness of the impact of climate change on 1 billion kids by sharing this appeal with your friends and family. 

Fundraise for kids in climate crisis 
If you’d like to fundraise with your community to support our work protecting children in climate crisis, you can start a fundraiser here.  

On 3 November 2022 in Jacobabad, Sindh province, Pakistan, children walk home through contaminated floodwater.

Other ways you can donate

By phone 

If you’d like to donate over the phone, call our friendly team on 0800 243 575. 

By online banking 

If you’d like to donate direct to our bank account, please use account 01-0505-0463764-00 and code ‘CCC-WS’ 

Disclaimer

In the unlikely event that the funds raised exceed UNICEF's funding requirements for this appeal, your one-off or monthly donation will go to our Greatest Need Appeal. 

You life-saving monthly donations will support this appeal for six months. After that they will go into our Global Parent fund to save and protect kids worldwide. 

UPDATED: 13th October, 2023

Donate to this appeal