Environment and Energy

Climate Change Affects All the MDGs

The United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) provide a framework for the entire UN system to work coherently together toward a common end. UNDP’s global development network on the ground in 166 countries is uniquely positioned to help advocate for change, connect countries to knowledge and resources, and coordinate broader efforts at the country level.

Below are some of the ways climate change affects the MDGs:

		Agricultural production and food security, access to clean and abundant water resources and gainful employment that underpin the solution to extreme poverty and hunger are vulnerable to climate change.
		Climate change stresses pose additional burdens on agricultural production and other subsistence activities like water collection, which may burden families enough to remove children from school. Livelihood activities must become more resilient to future climate for education goals to be met. Climate change also threatens to destroy infrastructure (e.g. schools) and increase the displacement and migration of families thus disrupting and limiting education opportunities.
		Women, the majority of the world's poor, are the most vulnerable to climate change. Their traditional roles as the primary users and managers of natural resources, primary caregivers, and unpaid laborers mean they are involved in and dependant on resources that are put most at risk by climate change. Further women lack rights and access to resources and information vital to overcoming the challenges posed by climate change.
		Climate change will worsen health primarily through: increased vulnerability to poor health due to reduced food security and water security; water-borne diseases associated with reduced water quality due to floods and drought; more favourable conditions for the spread of vector-borne and air-borne diseases; and the direct link between temperatures and heat stress.
		Climate change will worsen health primarily through: increased vulnerability to poor health due to reduced food security and water security; water-borne diseases associated with reduced water quality due to floods and drought; more favourable conditions for the spread of vector-borne and air-borne diseases; and the direct link between temperatures and heat stress.
		Climate change will worsen health primarily through: increased vulnerability to poor health due to reduced food security and water security; water-borne diseases associated with reduced water quality due to floods and drought; more favourable conditions for the spread of vector-borne and air-borne diseases; and the direct link between temperatures and heat stress.
		Climate change threatens environmental sustainability because it will cause fundamental alterations in ecosystem relationships, change the quality and quantity of available natural resources, & reduce ecosystem productivity. The poor depend on these resources for their day-to-day survival and livelihoods in many parts of the developing world.
		Climate change threatens to exacerbate current challenges to the achievement of the MDGs. Funding for development and adaptation must be greatly increased to meet the needs of the poor.