NAIROBI, Feb. 14 (Xinhua) — Kenya said Wednesday that more than 12 million children in the country are affected by risks associated with climate shocks and stressors.
The Ministry of Environment, Climate Change and Forestry said out of the number, 2.4 million of them live in arid and semi-arid counties where the impact of climate change is extremely high.
“These children’s survival, therefore, faces an imminent threat from climate change impacts,” the ministry said in a statement released in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi.
Some of the severe effects of climate change that affect children include diseases like cholera caused by flooding and malnutrition due to drought.
There is also displacement from their homes due to both drought and flooding caused by heavy rainfall, with the two weather events having become common in Kenya in the past years.
“The dire situation calls for urgent and targeted interventions by every part of society to secure the future of Kenyan children,” the ministry said.
It added that Kenya and its development partners are working on a children’s disaster risk model that would also recommend ways to protect the little ones from the impacts of climate change.
According to the National Drought Management Authority, about 1 million children suffer from malnutrition in Kenya due to frequent drought, especially in arid and semi-arid areas.
Kenya is among the countries in the Horn of Africa that are worst hit by climate change, with the others being Somalia and Ethiopia.
According to the UN, in 2023 during the worst drought in 40 years in the Horn of Africa, some 23.4 million people faced hunger, out of whom 5.1 million were children and were malnourished.
