Boshoff/Protecting the African child in a changing climate
24
CONTENT:
1
2
3
4
1
Introduction .................................................................................................................. 24
Climate change and the African child ..................................................................... 27
Protection of the child under the African human rights system ...................... 31
3.1
3.2
3.3
3.4
3.5
Basic principles in the African Children’s Rights Charter ..................................... 31
Right to development and clean environment....................................................... 34
Access to education................................................................................................. 35
Conflict and migration............................................................................................ 37
Participation and access to information ................................................................38
Conclusion and recommendations .......................................................................... 39
INTRODUCTION
Climate change is a phenomenon that results from increased
greenhouse gasses being released through the burning of wood and
fossil fuels, which results in more heat being trapped into the
atmosphere.1 The consequences include increased flooding and
drought as rainfall patterns shift and become less predictable, a rise in
sea levels as a result of melting ice in the polar regions as well as
increased natural disasters, biodiversity destruction and spread of
disease resulting from warming temperatures on land and sea. The
impact of these consequences on humans include food insecurity where
more erratic rainfall combined with higher or lower temperatures
result in less crops being produced, water shortages as a result of
increased drought, often together with flash floods and other natural
disasters and a heightened risk of displacement and migration as some
areas become uninhabitable.2 Certain illnesses are also becoming more
widespread as a result of a changing climate.3 As temperatures
increase, malaria is spreading into the higher and previously colder
regions of East and Southern Africa.4 The prevalence of water-borne
diseases such as hepatitis E, cholera, diarrhoea and parasitic infections
1
The Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change, the most authoritative body on
climate science in its Fifth Assessment Report found that it is beyond reasonable doubt
that climate change is taking place and that there is a 95per cent chance that it is as a
result of human activities. IPCC ‘Climate Change 2014: Synthesis Report’ (2014)
Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the Fifth Assessment Report of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
2
JJ Romm ‘Present and future climate realities for children’ in UNICEF (ed) The
challenge of climate change: children on the front line (2014) 6; R Hanna & P Oliva
‘Implications of climate change for children in developing countries’ in The Future of
Children (ed) (2016) Children and climate change http://www.futureofchildren.org/
publications/journals/journal_details/index.xml?journalid=86 (accessed 25 September
2016) 115; I Niang et al ‘Africa’ in IPCC Working Group II (ed) (2014) Impacts,
adaptation, and vulnerability. Part B: Regional Aspects. Contribution of Working
Group II to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change 1237-1238.
3
United Nations Development Programme ‘Resource Guide on Gender and Climate
Change’ (2009) http://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/librarypage/womensempowerment/resource-guide-on-gender-and-climate-change.html
(accessed
12 October 2017).
4
United Nations Women Watch ‘Fact Sheet: Women, Gender Equality and Climate
Change’ (2009) 4; Climate and Development Knowledge Network (CDKN) ‘The IPCC’s
Fifth Assessment Report: What’s in it for Africa?’ (2014) 11 http://cdkn.org/resource/
highlights-africa-ar5/?loclang=en_gb (accessed 10 October 2016).