A/HRC/35/13 with disabilities and others in vulnerable situations. Girls also face heightened risks due to climate change. Additionally, disproportionate impacts will be felt by children living in developing countries, particularly those in geographically vulnerable areas, such as riparian and low-lying coastal areas, arid regions, high mountains, polar zones and other delicate ecosystems. The following sections contain illustrative examples of the disproportionate impacts of climate change on girls, indigenous children, children with disabilities and children on the move. 1. Girls and pregnant women 21. Girls are more likely to be pulled from school to perform household chores, such as eldercare, fetching water and cooking, when households are affected by climate change stresses.33 To counteract the effects of climate change on livelihoods, girls may sometimes be sold into child marriage, trafficked or forced to work, with resulting impacts on their education, health, liberty and security. Evidence also suggests that food insecurity associated with climate change disproportionately affects girls. 34 22. Situations of crisis can exacerbate gender inequalities, affecting girls more and differently. Gender inequalities have been linked to higher rates of mortality from natural disasters among women and girls.35 In post-disaster settings, pregnant women, with their distinct needs for maternal health care, food, water, sanitation and hygiene, face unique health risks. Exposure to extreme temperatures, infection with water- and vector-borne diseases and post-disaster emotional distress during pregnancy have been associated with negative impacts on pregnancy outcomes, including miscarriage, premature birth and anaemia.36 Girls’ security and bodily integrity can also be threatened by climate changerelated displacement. Evacuation to shelters lacking safe facilities for girls has been documented to heighten risks of all forms of sexual harassment and violence, including human trafficking. This can result in higher rates of forced girl pregnancies and forced marriages.37 2. Indigenous children 23. Many indigenous peoples rely upon climate-sensitive ecosystems for livelihoods as well as spiritual and cultural practices. Therefore, they are particularly threatened by the degradation of land, water and biodiversity. For example, the traditional livelihoods of indigenous peoples in the Arctic have been adversely affected by rising temperatures. 38 Many indigenous children live in impoverished communities which affects their capacity for climate adaptation. Indigenous peoples constitute approximately 15 per cent of the world’s poor and one third of the 900 million people living in extreme poverty in rural areas.39 Indigenous children may also be negatively affected by actions taken to mitigate climate change, such as projects related to the production of biofuel or hydroelectric power, which have sometimes resulted in the displacement of entire indigenous communities without their free, prior and informed consent.40 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 Global Gender and Climate Alliance, Gender and Climate Change: A Closer Look at Existing Evidence (2016), pp. 17-18. Ibid., p. 25. Eric Neumayer and Thomas Plümper, “The gendered nature of natural disasters: the impact of catastrophic events on the gender gap in life expectancy, 1981-2002”, Annals of the Association of American Geographers, vol. 97, No. 3 (2007). Global Gender and Climate Alliance, Gender and Climate Change, p. 29. Anita Swarup and others, Weathering the Storm: Adolescent Girls and Climate Change (Plan International, 2011), available at www.ungei.org/files/weatherTheStorm.pdf; and Claudia FeltanBierman, “Gender and natural disaster: sexualized violence and the tsunami”, Development, vol. 49, No. 3 (September 2006). Field and others, Climate Change 2014, p. 1583. Department of Economic and Social Affairs, State of the World’s Indigenous Peoples (New York, United Nations, 2009), p. 21. United Nations Environment Programme, Climate Change and Human Rights (Nairobi, 2015), pp. 89. 7