The future of childhood hangs in the balance by 2050 if urgent action is not taken to safeguard children’s rights in a changing world, Unicef warned in its flagship report released on World Children’s Day on Wednesday.

The report, titled ‘The State of the World’s Children 2024: The Future of Childhood in a Changing World’, projects how three major global forces — or megatrends — will impact children’s lives by 2050 and beyond.

The megatrends — demographic change, climate and environmental crises, and breakthrough technologies — provide key indications of the challenges and opportunities children may face in the future.

“Children are experiencing a myriad of crises, from climate shocks to online dangers, and these are set to intensify in the years to come,” said Unicef Executive Director Catherine Russell in a press release issued on Tuesday.

“The projections in this report demonstrate that the decisions world leaders make today — or fail to make — define the world children will inherit. Creating a better future in 2050 requires more than just imagination, it requires action. Decades of progress, particularly for girls, are under threat.”

The climate crisis is already dire, with 2023 being the hottest year on record.

According to the report, between 2050 and 2059, climate and environmental crises were expected to become even more widespread, with eight times as many children exposed to extreme heat waves, three times as many exposed to extreme river floods, and nearly twice as many exposed to extreme wildfires compared to the 2000s.

How these climate hazards impact children would be determined by their age, health, socioeconomic setting and access to resources, the press release said.

“For example, a child with access to climate-resilient shelter, cooling infrastructure, health care, education, and clean water has a greater chance of surviving climatic shocks compared to a child without access.”

According to Unicef, the report underscored the urgent need for targeted environmental action to mitigate the risks children face.

By the 2050s, there will be an increase to approximately 1.3 million children living in 14 Pacific Island Countries, including Cook Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, Niue, Palau, Republic of Marshall Islands, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tokelau, Tonga, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu, according to data collected by the Pacific Community.

“These demographic shifts present both opportunities and challenges,” said Unicef in another press release. “While a larger number of children and youth will be the backbone for achieving 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent, the Pacific Island nations, increasingly under pressure to expand delivery of essential social services, need to prioritise their investment in children so that they can survive, thrive, and reach their full potential.”

“Young children born here today are only going to achieve about 47 per cent of their development potential,” the press release added, citing the World Bank. “A lot more needs to be done.”

According to the press release, the report acknowledged that frontier technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) offer “promise and peril” for children, who are already interacting with AI through apps, toys, games and learning software.

“The report notes that a large percentage of youth in low-and middle-income countries, including the Pacific, have difficulty accessing digital skills, and this will impact their ability to effectively and responsibly use digital tools in education and future workplaces,” Unicef said, adding that these barriers were linked to socioeconomic settings, gender, linguistics, and accessibility.

The report added that gains in children’s access to education over the last 100 years were projected to continue, with nearly 96pc of children globally expected to have at least a primary education by the 2050s, up from 80pc in the 2000s.

Through increased investment in education and public health and more stringent environmental protection, the report predicted that outcomes for children could improve significantly; the gender gap in educational attainment was expected to narrow and exposure to environmental hazards would be reduced.

“The State of the World’s Children 2024 underscores the importance of centring child rights, as outlined in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, in all strategies, policies and actions,” Unicef said.

Unicef called for meeting the challenges and opportunities posed by the three megatrends by investing in education, services and sustainable and resilient cities for children.