Children and the right to grow up in an environment supporting their health and well-being: A sound environment, provided for and encapsulated in the Convention on the Rights of the Child

We will work for common measures for the protection of the environment, at all levels, so that children can enjoy a safer and healthier future... There can be no task nobler than giving every child a better future! (World Declaration on the Survival, Protection and Development of Children, World Summit for Children 1990.)

Deteriorating environmental conditions have their most profound impact on infants and children. All children are exposed, from the prenatal phase, to a barrage of environmental threats to their health and survival. It costs millions of children their lives, and impedes the growth and progress of countless others. The state of the environment is a key determinant of foetal growth, whether a child survives the first year of life, and their further physical and mental development. Growing children are particularly vulnerable, as their physical characteristics, childhood activities and natural curiosity, put them at greater risk from environmental hazards.2