UNICEF presents report on World?s Children
This evening the United Nations Children’s Fund, UNICEF, released its annual publication on the state of the world’s children. The seventeen-page report, which was launched in Punta Gorda, focuses on how poverty, armed conflict and AIDS threaten a child’s ability to grow and develop to his or her full potential. According to UNICEF?s Representative in Belize, Nadya Vasquez, one billion children worldwide are living in poverty. This represents almost fifty percent of the total population of children and adolescents. Vasquez says that although Belizean young people are not victims of war, they still face the overwhelming problems of poverty and deadly disease.
Nadya Vasquez, UNICEF Representative, Belize
?The report is a report that UNICEF prepares at the end of each year with the situation of children, but especially we try to identify the most important issues that affect children. It?s about the most important issue that most call our attention in the next year, which is 2005. In this case, it?s poverty, HIV/AIDS and arm conflict.?
?In the world we have half of the population is living in poverty. Children are living in poverty. It is the same situation that we have in Belize. Half of the children are poor, especially in the Toledo District. Our interest is to try and strengthen the capacity of the organisation and the institution to coordinate efforts. With participation of the people in the communities to elaborate plans that can support and fight against the poverty.?
?Probably in Belize we do not have arm conflict, but the poverty means that we need something to fight.?
?I think that everything is possible here in Belize. You can achieve everything here. But we need to work together, bring efforts together and I am sure that it?s possible to move into 2015 in a much better situation.?
In September Prime Minister Said Musa and Leader of the Opposition Dean Barrow officially endorsed a National Plan of Action for Children and Adolescents. The signing means that Belize confirmed its commitment to achieve the UN’s millennium development goals by 2015. The plan outlines specific actions in the areas of poverty alleviation, education, health, child protection, HIV and AIDS, family and culture. Vasquez says this is the best formula to guarantee holistic development for Belizean children.
