Leaders Must Take Urgent Action to Limit Global Temperature Rise to 1.5° C: Save the Children

FAIRFIELD, Conn. (July 28, 2023)—The climate crisis is a child rights crisis with grave implications for current and future generations of children, who are already bearing the brunt of its impacts, Save the Children warned.

Responding to UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres’ comments yesterday, Jack Wakefield, Save the Children’s Global Policy and Advocacy Lead on Climate Change, said:

"We wholeheartedly support Antonio Guterres’ calls to limit global temperature rise to 1.5° C above pre-industrial levels in the face of “the era of global boiling.” Not doing so will cost children their rights now and in the future.

"Our research released with the Vrije Universiteit Brussel shows that under initial Paris Agreement emission reduction pledges, children will face on average seven times as many scorching heatwaves, twice as many wildfires and three times as many crop failures as their grandparents’ generation—with children in low-income countries and those who are impacted by inequality, poverty, and discrimination suffering first and worst.

"We must see urgent action on all fronts to rapidly phase out the use and subsidy of fossil fuels—as well as placing children’s rights, voices, and needs at the heart of climate finance and loss and damage funding arrangements."

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