One Year After ICJ Climate Ruling, Just 2.4% of Funds Shield Children’s Health

As climate change drives up rates of malnutrition, vector-borne disease, and heat-related illness among children, health advocates point to the ICJ’s advisory opinion as a legal mandate to invest in child-health adaptation. Yet one year later, a staggering 2.4% allocation gap persists, undermining efforts to protect vulnerable youth.

One year ago today, the International Court of Justice delivered a historic advisory opinion that fundamentally reshaped the legal landscape of state obligations on climate change. On 23 July 2025, the ICJ declared that a state's failure to take appropriate action to protect the climate system from greenhouse gas emissions may constitute an internationally wrongful act, extending obligations beyond the explicit commitments of the Paris Agreement. Now, as the one-year anniversary is marked by advocacy organisations and youth activists, a glaring disconnect emerges between legal responsibility and financial action: only 2.4% of climate finance from key multilateral funds supports child-responsive activities. This stark statistic, drawn from a 2023 Children’s Environmental Rights Initiative report, has become a rallying cry for Save the Children and the young people on the frontlines of the climate crisis.

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Save the Children, through its NextGen Youth Ambassador Vepaiamele, a 17-year-old from Vanuatu, is calling for a radical shift.

The ICJ’s opinion was monumental not only for its recognition of customary international law but for its practical implications. While advisory opinions are non-binding, they carry immense weight in clarifying the scope of existing obligations. The United Nations General Assembly endorsed the opinion in May 2026, unanimously adopting a resolution drafted by Vanuatu that affirmed nations’ binding legal duty to protect the climate system. This political affirmation transforms the ICJ’s findings into a powerful normative tool, one that can shape national litigation, influence treaty negotiations, and pressure multilateral bodies to align finance with rights. For the world’s 2.2 billion children, who are disproportionately vulnerable to climate-induced health crises, displacement, and malnutrition, the opinion signals that the era of voluntary climate action is over—states now face a clear legal mandate to act.

Yet the response from climate finance institutions remains inadequate. The 2.4% figure highlights a systemic failure to integrate child rights into climate programming. Multilateral funds such as the Green Climate Fund and the Global Environment Facility have historically prioritised large-scale mitigation and infrastructure projects, while adaptation initiatives that directly benefit children—such as child-friendly water, sanitation and hygiene systems, school-based early warning networks, and nutrition resilience—are chronically underfunded. Save the Children, through its NextGen Youth Ambassador Vepaiamele, a 17-year-old from Vanuatu, is calling for a radical shift. Vepaiamele, who travelled to The Hague with the Vanuatu delegation during the advisory proceedings, emphasised that “protecting the climate system isn’t optional. It’s an obligation under international law.” She and other Pacific youth demand not just recognition of their vulnerability but a genuine partnership that gives them agency and resources to address the crisis on their own terms.