Exploring the Effects of Climate Change on Child Malnutrition: A Scoping Review

Climate change is silently reshaping childhood, especially in the world's most vulnerable regions. This scoping review explores how environmental stressors-such as rising temperatures, altered rainfall patterns, droughts, and floods-affect the nutritional status of children under 5 years of age.

A systematic search of four major databases yielded 1586 studies, of which 37 met the inclusion criteria.

Our findings reveal that climate change impacts child malnutrition primarily through indirect pathways influenced by food insecurity, disruptions in agricultural production, and deep-rooted socioeconomic inequalities. Stunting emerged as the most frequently and severely affected outcome, while overweight and obesity were rarely addressed-highlighting important gaps in the current evidence. Socioeconomic factors such as caregiver education, rural residence, and household income were consistently identified as key variables, shaping the extent to which climate risks translate into nutritional harm. Most studies focused on countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, where the burden of vulnerability is greatest. Beyond documenting associations, this review draws attention to a broader reality: that child nutrition today is threatened not by a single crisis but by a web of interconnected challenges.

As the global polycrisis unfolds, early childhood nutrition demands urgent, coordinated responses that are evidence-based, socially just, and future-oriented.