Reproductive justice and the climate emergency in the UK

Climate change, global heating, air pollution, toxic chemicals, environmental degradation and the decline of nature – referred to collectively as the climate and biodiversity emergency – pose severe challenges to reproductive, maternal, infant and child health. In the UK, we are already seeing the significant impacts of the climate emergency on women’s ability to conceive; sustain healthy pregnancies; and birth and parent their children in safety and health. We also know that women facing poverty, inequality and disadvantage, and those from Black and Brown communities disproportionately bear the impacts of these factors.

This briefing paper from Birth Companions and Wen adds to the Feminist Green New Deal (FGND) policy paper series developed in recent years by Wen and the Women’s Budget Group, using the framework of reproductive justice to interrogate specific challenges brought about by the climate emergency, and demonstrate the myriad ways in which the climate emergency undermines our rights.

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