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Child-focused organisations collaborate on alternative to government report on child rights
30 Oct 2008 09:26:17 GMT
 Source: World Vision Middle East/Eastern Europe office (MEERO)
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Child Rights are promoted throughout World Vision's community projects. Photo: Laura Runcanu
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Child Rights are promoted throughout World Vision's community projects. Photo: Laura Runcanu
World Vision MEERO, http://meero.worldvision.org

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By Mirela Savu

Child protection focused groups in Romania have submitted an alternative report, in response to a government report, to the United Nations commission on the Rights of Children in Geneva.

Some 125 Romanian professionals working in the field of child protection and welfare worked on an alternative report on the 'Respect for Children's Rights in Romania'. An alternative report was written as groups believed the government report failed to offer an effective analysis of the progress made regarding the application of laws and of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

According to these professionals representing 86 non-government organisations working in Romania, the government's country report focused on describing a set of laws, from a technical perspective, giving few concrete examples or statistical data.
The alternative report was drafted as part of a project implemented by the Federation for Child Protection (FONCP) from September 2007 to July 2008. The project was co-financed by UNICEF Romania and the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

World Vision Romania contributed to the alternative report, through Ms. Nina Petre, who co-ordinated the group working on Family Environment and Alternative Care.

'Over the last 10 years, since the beginning of the child protection system reform in Romania, we had many achievements. Still, we have a lot of work ahead of us. There was quite an amount of energy that was put into the creation of this report and we have tried to write it from a realistic perspective. Now, we are waiting to get feedback and recommendations from the Commission in Geneva and only then we will be able to see how World Vision and other NGOs should re-direct their strategies to respond to these recommendations,' said Ms. Petre.

Some of the issues identified and highlighted in the alternative report refer to difficulties in providing services with the right staff, in terms of structure, qualifications, and skills working in the General Department of Social Care and Child Protection – one of the main institutions working in the child protection area. Some 66 per cent of all communes in the country have only one social worker in the community.

The report identifies discrimination of people with HIV or AIDS, Roma children and children with disabilities as still an issue in Romania. With the poverty rate for Roma children at 77.2 per cent, more than three times higher than for children of other ethnicities, the alternative report affirmed there is still a need to promote non-discrimination in all institutions delivering child and family services, promote the views of the child in their family, schools and institutions, and raise awareness about these rights to parents, teachers, government and administration officials.

A lack of well prepared staff in rural schools and an overall lack of extra-curricular activities are just few of the problems that the Romanian educational system is facing. The poverty rate for children in rural areas, at 32.9 per cent, is double that of children in urban areas, at 15.6 per cent.

In 2005, Romania had the smallest number of children's clubs and only 18 per cent of Romanian children attended organised spare time activities. Most children attending sports clubs were from urban areas, according to a 2006 UNICEF report, 'Children on the Edge of Hope'.

Collaboration of central and local authorities working in the child protection area, with NGOs, was another issue mentioned in the alternative report.

Also, now that Romania is an European Union country, there has been a decrease in donor funding for Romanian NGOs. Also NGOs have to compete directly with county public authorities for governmental funding, discouraging public-private partnerships. As the center administration does not consider the private sector a real partner when making child and children's right policies, strategies, and action plans, it is quite difficult for NGOs to get involved.


[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]

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[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]

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Last updated:Thu Oct 30 10:09:21 2008