3. MDGs and children

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3. MDGs and children

• Children in Developing Countries
• Lecture course by Dr. Renata Serra

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Millenium Development Goalsadopted at the
Millenium Summit (Sept. 2000)

• Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
• T1 T2 Halve between 1990 and 2015 the
  proportion of people whose income is less than 1
  a day and who suffer from hunger
• Achieve universal primary education
• T3 ensure that by 2015 children everywhere, boys
  and girls alike, will be able to complete a full
  course of primary schooling
• Promote gender equality and empower women
• T4 eliminate gender disparity in primary and
  secondary education by 2005, and in all levels of
  ed. not later than 2015
• Reduce child mortality
• T5 reduce by 2/3 between 1990 and 2015 the IMR5
• Improve maternal health
• T6 reduce by ¾ the maternal mortality ratio
• Combat HIV/AIDS, and other diseases
• Ensure environmental sustainability
• T10 reverse by 2015 the proportion of people
  without sustainable access to safe drinking water
  and basic sanitation
• Develop global partnership for development

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The MDGs CRC

• MDGs are bold and ambitious goals (as in CRC)
• Most MDGs are about children
• MDGs require not just increase in service
  provision but also a wider approach to children
  that incorporate their full rights
• Common principles of universality and
  non-discrimination

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MDGs are not enough

• Focus on MDGs will not be sufficient to help all
  children many are bound to be left out!
• National averages mask unacceptable living
  conditions for a minority
• Policy focus on populous countries (India and
  China) detract away from the plight of children
  elsewhere
• Many children will continue to remain invisible
  to governments, agencies and Millennium programs
• ? Need to go deeper and pay attention to the
  rights of the most vulnerable children

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Excluded and invisible children

• Exclusion from
• Essential services
• An environment that protects children from
  violence, abuse and exploitation
• Full social and political participation
• Excluded by
• Family, community, society, governments, etc.
• Exclusion (social, economic and political) is
  dangerous because it breeds further exclusion
• At some point children become invisible
• They disappear from statistics, policies and
  programs

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The causes of exclusion

• National level
• Limited government resources (countrys poverty)
• Children not regarded as priority under tight
  budgets
• Inadequate government policies
• Weak political and administrative capacity
• Inability to carry out intended measures
• HIV/AIDS and other major diseases
• Wars and conflicts

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Causes of exclusion (contd)

• Sub-national level
• Within each country, children of particular
  groups are excluded
• Discrimination occurs according to income,
  rural-urban divide, gender, ethnicity, religion
• Income inequality is very high in LAC (Brazil)
  and in South Africa
• Differential in under-5 mortality rates may be
  stunning (Peru)
• Exclusion may start with non-registration at
  birth for some minority or indigenous groups and
  lack of coverage in national statistics
• Disabled children face huge discrimination
  everywhere
• In poor countries, much of disability is also
  preventable

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Critical inter-linkages

• Early childhood events have lasting effects on
  subsequent individual development
• At individual level, deprivation in one area
  interacts with many others
• Malnutrition ? physical development / disease ?
  reduced life potential
• ? ability to learn ? productivity and
  earning
• On a macro-scale, childrens exclusion from the
  benefits of development ? reduced country
  socio-economic development and political
  instability