Opinion



The Missing Chapter in
Your Sustainability Report: Childhood

Global Child Forum

PUBLISHED: JUNE, 2025

Each year on World Environment Day, businesses take the opportunity to spotlight their climate commitments, sustainability innovations, and green goals. ESG reports are released. Campaigns are launched. Carbon footprints are calculated. But as we read through these glossy reports, one thing is almost always missing: children. Not metaphorically. Literally.

Despite being one-third of the global population, children are too often left out of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) strategies—and even more so in environmental reporting. The new European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) provide a powerful opportunity to change that. But only if companies are willing to look.

Why Children Belong in Environmental Reporting

Climate change, pollution, water scarcity, and biodiversity loss aren’t just environmental problems—they are children’s rights issues.

  • Children breathe faster and take in more air per kilo of body weight than adults—making them more vulnerable to air pollution.
  • Children are more likely to suffer from contaminated water, inadequate sanitation, and toxic waste.
  • Climate-related displacement disproportionately affects children, cutting off access to education, nutrition, and healthcare.

Yet these impacts rarely make it into corporate environmental disclosures. When they do, they’re framed as long-term risks for “future generations,” not real-time harms to children today.

Just ask 12-year-old Amari Werito from Counselor, New Mexico. He regularly misses school due to nausea and headaches caused by the “rotten egg with propane” smell from nearby oil and gas wells. At Lybrook Elementary, where he studies alongside 70 other children, students report vomiting, fatigue, and other symptoms tied to toxic air pollution. Researchers found spikes in cancer-causing pollutants like benzene during school hours—nearly double the levels known to cause chronic health effects.

This isn’t a future problem. It’s happening now.

How to Start Including Children This World Environment Day

1. Map environmental risks to children in your value chain

Look at how your operations, sourcing, and waste management affect children—directly and indirectly.

2. Use the ESRS to disclose child-relevant impacts

Go beyond compliance. Use ESRS 2 (General Disclosures) and topical standards like E1 (Climate) or E5 (Resource Use) to incorporate children’s vulnerability into your materiality assessments.

3. Amplify children’s voices in environmental decision-making

Whether through community consultations, employee family feedback, or partnerships with child rights organisations—find ways to listen.

4. Report with specificity, not generalities

Don’t relegate children to a one-line statement under “vulnerable groups.” Highlight where and how your business is taking child-specific environmental action.

The ESRS: A Game-Changer, If Used Right

The European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS), adopted under the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), are meant to shift ESG from feel-good narratives to accountable, comparable action.

But here’s the catch: children’s rights aren’t yet fully mainstreamed in the ESRS frameworks—especially when it comes to environmental disclosures. That means companies need to take the initiative.

Because Childhood Isn’t a Footnote

If your company is serious about sustainability, then it’s time to write the missing chapter. This World Environment Day, commit to seeing the environment not only through the lens of CO₂—but also through the eyes of a child. Because the real test of sustainable leadership isn’t just how green your business looks on paper. It’s how well it protects those who have the most to lose.

GO FURTHER

Global Child Forum, in collaboration with the LEGO Group, has launched the Corporate Playbook: Embedding Children’s Rights in ESRS Reporting, a practical guide showing companies how to interpret the ESRS through a child rights lens. It's a reminder that responsible environmental practices must be child-centered if they’re truly to be future-proof.

To the Corporate Playbook