The FINANCIAL — In order to reduce child poverty, which is one of the biggest challenges in Georgia, UNICEF, mandated by the United Nations General Assembly to advocate for the protection of children’s rights, recommends that the state allocate GEL 20 million of financial assistance which is about GEL 30 per child per month to prevent child poverty. Nowadays, 50,000 children in Georgia are living in extreme poverty below the threshold of GEL 2 per day, according to UNICEF.
“This is less than half the subsistence minimum in Georgia,” said Maya Kurtsikidze, Communication Officer at UNICEF Georgia. “The longer a child lives in poverty the worse their social-economic state in adulthood is. Families with children are the poorest families in Georgia. The social assistance which is offered by the state does not reach the children unfortunately, meaning that children do not benefit from it. The existing social assistance programmes do not solve the problems that children face. This is the reason why children are the poorest layer of society. There is a high risk that a child who lives in poverty will continue to live their life in poverty in the future as well. This will raise the social assistance costs for the state because the state will have more poor members of its population and will have to care for more poor people. It would therefore be better for the state to reduce the poverty rate among children right now,” she added.
“There should be GEL 20 million of financial assistance provided for children in Georgia which is about GEL 30 per child per month. We understand that this is very expensive for the state. In the first stage it would be very useful if the state were to allocate GEL 2 million for extremely poor children in Georgia,” Kurtsikidze said.
“There are too many children in Georgia that are being left behind: 50,000 children are living in extreme poverty on less than half the subsistence minimum; there are children with disabilities that are deprived of family care; child victims of violence and those living and working in the streets; 2,388 children who are out of school; 300 children dying every year of malnutrition; and children from ethnic minorities and those living in hard-to reach and conflict-affected areas,” said Sascha Graumann, UNICEF Representative in Georgia. “We are grateful to the Parliament and the Government for their cooperation in preparing the legislative changes. The proposed laws and legal amendments will have a considerable impact on the lives of these children,” he added.
The second biggest problem that UNICEF names is the low quality of education in the country.
“Only 38% of students in Georgia are proficient in reading according to international studies. Poor student performance can also be seen in the high dropout rate at secondary school level, and their inability to meet the demands of the workplace later on. The quality of education depends on whether and how the critical issues related to teachers will be addressed. Teacher-related reforms are necessary. The changes need to be geared towards ensuring teacher quality and raising the status of the teaching profession,” Graumann added.
“If children cannot get a proper education then there will not be a proper labour force on the labour market of Georgia and they will not contribute to the state economy. This will be a loss for the country of course,” Kurtsikidze said.
Progress was achieved in initiating specific laws developed within the Year of the Protection of the Rights of the Child. The adopted concept and action plan submitted on the initiative of UNICEF envisage the review of very important legislative initiatives and amendments before the end of the year, as well as a number of significant activities related to protection of the rights of the child.
“We have been cooperating with parliament during the whole year to work on these changes. Eight legislative changes and new laws were proposed for Parliament. These were: the Juvenile Justice Code; the Law on Early and Preschool Education; the Law on Adoption and Foster Care; a legislative package to strengthen the legal protection of victims of domestic violence; amendments to the Law on Prevention of Iodine, Other Microelement and Vitamin Deficiencies; amendments to the Law on Patients’ Rights and to the Law on Social Assistance; and a legislative package to ensure documentation/identification for children living and/or working on the streets. From these initiatives some have already been implemented, out of which one of the most important is the legislative package to strengthen the legal protection of victims of domestic violence. This law introduces specific provisions to protect children who are victims of violence. New terms, such as neglect and coercion, have been added to the definition of violence and compulsory reporting was introduced,” Kurtsikidze said.
Half of the Georgian population considers violence to be reasonable for punishment of a child, according to our research. 60 percent of the population uses violence to punish a child.
“During the last 25 years the child mortality rate has decreased but is still high. Child mortality has been reduced and all children are now enrolled in education. But too many children still do not enjoy their full rights,” Kurtsikidze said.
To solve all these problems and help the authorities in this, UNICEF plans to arrange different kinds of events and discussions where not only UNICEF members or its partners will be involved, but society as well. For example, a discussion will be held on 5 December, 2014, at the Writers’ House of Georgia where well-known writers will talk about education issues and the importance of qualified education for children.
“They will share their opinions on how they see establishing a better educational system for children. This year Georgian musicians expressed their desire to be involved in the process of child rights and Nikoloz Rachveli, Georgian conductor, composer and cultural manager dedicated his performance World Cinema-Music Masterpieces to the 25th anniversary of child rights. During the performances Nikoloz Rachveli spoke to the audience about child rights. It is very useful when writers, musicians, actors and famous people in general discuss child rights issues,” Kurtsikidze said.
“Worldwide such campaigns are already very widely used. For example, recently UNICEF was given permission by Yoko Ono to launch #IMAGINE, which offers millions of people the chance to record their own versions of the Lennon classic using an iPhone and iPad app – and you even get to place yourself inside the video alongside A-listers. Inside the app, they’ll see where around the world other people have recorded their versions of Imagine and will be invited to record their own. Katy Perry, Nicole Scherzinger, Idris Elba, will.i.am and David Guetta are among dozens of stars launching the biggest sing-along in history – and you’re invited to join them. The video spearheads a global campaign by UNICEF to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Besides, as the Convention rings its 25th anniversary we call every 25 year old person to share their childhood experiences and share their opinions about what problems they faced and what are the useful things that should be done to solve these problems,” Kurtsikidze said.
There are about 1,000-1,500 children living and working in the streets in the four main cities of Georgia, according to UNICEF.
“There is a state mechanism developed to help these people. From 2013 for the first time in Georgia mobile groups consisting of social worker, psychologist and peer educator (a person who has lived on the streets before and has experience in it) have been working in the streets to take children from street to ‘Day Care Centres’ or to orphanages. There are three Day Care Centres in Tbilisi and several orphanages. It is not easy to take children off the streets as they are used to living there. Some of them have such psychological trauma that it takes time to persuade them to leave the streets. We cannot force them to follow the mobile groups. One day there will be no more children living on the streets however. This is our goal,” said Kurtsikidze.
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