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Tag: UNICEF

  • Handwashing rates lowest in low-income countries – UNICEF

    Handwashing rates lowest in low-income countries – UNICEF

    • Lack of access to hygiene could endanger new Development Agenda

    A report from the The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF has proven that handwashing with soap is dangerously low in many countries.

    This report is in spite of UNICEF’s proven benefits of child health.

    The eighth Global Handwashing Day comes less than a month after the United Nations (UN) adopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), including hygiene for the first time in the global agenda.

    One of the SDGs targets is to achieve ‘access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene’ by 2030.

    UNICEF says improvements in hygiene must supplement access to water and sanitation, or children will continue to fall victim to easily preventable diseases like diarrhoea.

    “Along with drinking water and access to toilets, hygiene (particularly, handwashing with soap) is the essential third leg of the stool holding up the Goal on water and sanitation,” said Sanjay Wijesekera, Global Head of UNICEF’s Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Programmes.

    “From birth (when the unwashed hands of birth attendants can transmit dangerous pathogens) right through babyhood, school and beyond, handwashing is crucial for a child’s health. It is one of the cheapest, simplest and the most effective health interventions we have.”

     

    Sub-Saharan Africa, the region with the highest child mortality rates globally, also has particularly low levels of handwashing. The latest report from UNICEF and WHO says that in 38 countries in the region with available data, levels are at best 50 per cent.

     

    Even health care facilities often lack places for handwashing. Some 42 per cent of them in World Health Organisation (WHO)’s Africa Region have no water source available within 500 meters.

     

    Meanwhile, according to the UN’s latest estimates, over 800 of the approximately 1,400 child deaths from diarrhoea each day can be attributed to inadequate water, sanitation or hygiene. Infants in the first month of life are particularly vulnerable to diseases transmitted by unwashed hands.

    A number of activities around the world will mark Global Handwashing Day and aim to teach the importance of handwashing with soap especially to children. Which are as follows:

     

    • Democratic Republic of the Congo: A national drawing competition on handwashing in schools will reach 300,000 students in 1,500 schools; and messages will reach 3,000,000 people in 5,500 villages.

     

    • Haiti: A soccer match (Clean Hands vs. Dirty Hands) is planned, as well as a parade, community radio spots, songs, poems, a drawing competition and handwashing demonstrations in public places.

     

    • Kiribati: All 94 Primary Schools, 24 Junior Secondary Schools and 16 Senior Secondary Schools will take part in group hand washing. Students will design posters and banners, and promote handwashing in marches, song, dancing, drama, speech, poems and art.

     

    • Sri Lanka: The Government of Sri Lanka is hosting a week-long learning exchange among schools to establish best practice for programmes across Asia and the Pacific. UNICEF Ambassador for South Asia, cricketer Sachin Tendulkar, will be involved in promoting the importance of handwashing.

     

    • Viet Nam: 8,000 children will participate in an event aimed at helping them to encourage their families to practice handwashing with soap.
  • UNICEF ambassadors back new development era for children

    UNICEF ambassadors back new development era for children

    UNICEF Goodwill ambassadors, Shakira and Angélique Kidjo have joined in celebrating the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals with powerful performances before an audience at the United Nations General Assembly including over 130 heads of state and government.
    Following an address from His Holiness Pope Francis, Shakira on Friday took to the stage to sing “Imagine”, John Lennon’s iconic anthem of love and peace.
    “We live in a world in which many who are born poor will die poor. It is up to us to be the first society to eradicate poverty and bring justice and equality to the most disenfranchised people on earth,” Shakira, a passionate advocate of children’s rights, told the assembled world leaders before her performance. “Our children have the right to equal opportunities; to thrive, to be happy, healthy, and safe.”
    Angélique Kidjo, who has been a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador since 2002, sang a moving version of ‘Afirika’ – her hymn to the continent she calls home.
    “Africa and its children have the most to gain from the Sustainable Development Goals, but they also have the most to lose if our leaders do not fully commit to this new agenda for peace and prosperity,” Kidjo said. “As an artist I want to use my voice to make sure that people around the world understand the new global goals and why they matter, so that they can hold their leaders accountable for their success or failure.”
    Flanked by a group of young people from across the world, Malala Yousafzai then delivered a message of hope for today’s children before the SDGs were ratified by world leaders.
    The Sustainable Development Goals represent an ambitious plan of action that aims to eliminate extreme poverty and hunger, provide quality lifelong education for all, protect the planet and promote peaceful and inclusive societies.
    These new global goals offer a historic opportunity to provide children with the fair start in life.

  • Boko Haram: 1. 4 m children forced to flee from home

    Over 1.4 million children had been forced to flee conflict in Nigeria and the region.
    Christophe Boulierac of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) disclosed this at a briefing by the Information Service of the United Nations.
    He said a sharp increase in attacks by the Boko Haram armed group had uprooted 500,000 children over the past five months.
    In northern Nigeria alone, Boulierac said nearly 1.2 million children had been forced to flee their homes while additionally, 265,000 children had been displaced to the neighbouring countries of Cameroon, Chad and Niger.
    Asked if the 1.2 million displaced children were accompanied by their families or alone,Boulierac said a number of children had been separated from their families, following attacks on their communities.
    He said women and children were increasingly being used and exploited by armed groups, in bombing attacks and other ways.
    ” Children were used as a tactic of war and it was the worst form of child abuse. It was important to consider children who were used for bomb attacks as victims and not perpetrators. Some were not even informed that they were carrying explosives,” Boulierac said.

  • Boko Haram: Number of displaced children hits 1.4m

    The number of children forced to flee Boko Haram’s insurgency in Nigeria and neighbouring countries has reached 1.4 million, the United Nations children agency said on Friday.

    About 500,000 were displaced in the last five months after a sharp rise in attacks by the sect, it said.

    The militants have been waging a six-year insurrection to establish an Islamist state in the northeast of Nigeria that has killed thousands and displaced 2.1 million people, most of whom are children.

    “In northern Nigeria alone, nearly 1.2 million children – over half of them under 5 years old – have been forced to flee their homes. An additional 265,000 children have been uprooted in Cameroon, Chad and Niger,” Reuters quoted UNICEF as saying in a statement.

    [ad id=”403656″]Boko Haram controlled vast swathes of territory across three states in northeastern Nigeria at the beginning of 2015 but was pushed out by Nigerian troops with the help of Chad, Niger and Cameroon.

    Now heavily splintered, Boko Haram factions have reverted to guerrilla tactics, raiding villages for supplies and bombing soft targets like places of worships, markets and bus stations.

    Attacks spiked between the end of May through July though the rainy season has seen a relative lull over the last month.

    UNICEF scaled up its operations and vaccinated over 315,000 children against measles this year as well as arranged safe drinking water for 200,000 people. It has also provided schooling and counselling.

    UNICEF said it has encountered funding problems after receiving only 32 per cent of the $50.3 million required this year for its humanitarian response across the Lake Chad region, creating a shortfall in measles vaccinations and other aids.

    The largest concentration of internally displaced persons (IDPs) and therefore children are in camps or host communities in Borno State capital Maiduguri, the birthplace of the insurgency. While the army has freed the last few towns still under some form of Boko Haram control, IDPs are reluctant to return home.

  • UNICEF-poly partnership bears fruit in Anambra

    UNICEF-poly partnership bears fruit in Anambra

    The partnership between United Nation International Children’s Fund (UNICEF), Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN) with the Federal Polytechnic Oko in Anambra state has started yielding results.

    Eight modern toilets have been built in the institution with the help of Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Agency (RUWASSA) under the Water Sanitation Hygiene (WASH) programme.

    This according to UNICEF is to ensure that the vision of achieving open defecation free by the year 2025 is achieved in the land.

    •One of the toilets being inspected by the team
    •One of the toilets being inspected by the team

    The WASH consultant for UNICEF, Nicholas Dosunmu, who led other members of the team to the institution on Monday, commended the management for partnering with them on the project.

    He said that they also came to Oko polytechnic to train participants who will in turn, take up the projects to their respective villages and communities in the state.

    Dosunmu said over fifty million Nigerians engaged in open defecation which according to him, could result in outbreak of epidemics.

    The UNICEF man also disclosed that federal polytechnic Oko was hosting the pilot scheme of the programme, expressing the hope that if the project succeeds, the name of the institution would be written in gold.

    The Director of International Linkages, Sir Walter Ezeanata thanked UNICEF for choosing the polytechnic for the pilot scheme and also, commended other agencies for making the polytechnic a hub for training participants for the WASH programme.

    Ezeanata disclosed that four of the toilets were sited at the female hostel, two beside the polytechnic field, one at the old Fine and Applied Arts site and the last at the extension site of the institution.

    Mr. Douglas Mba, the permanent secretary, state Ministry of Water resources and utility, said the state government was happy with the programme.

    He however, commended the institution for accepting to host the programme which he said, will go a long way in tackling open defecation.

    He described Anambra state as peculiar and unique, adding that before the projected 2025, the state would have achieved zero open air defecation through a high level sensitization and awareness.

    Another UNICEF consultant, Prof Dipak Roy, said he was excited that the programme lived up to expectation and tanked the institution for making it possible.

    The UNICEF representative expressed the readiness of the donor agency to partner the school in other areas that could improve lives of the people and sustaining virile environment.

    He assured that the polytechnic would not disappoint its partners by making sure that the project succeeds, adding that maintenance of the project was quite important.

    Also, Deputy Rector (Academics), Mrs. Gladys Anene said the project came when the institution was putting toilet facilities all over the places in the institution, adding that the Rector was a man who loves creativity.

    One of the participants in the training, Peter Akwobi while speaking with the Nation, described the training as a worthwhile experience.

    The toilets had two septic tanks of one metre each and could last up to seven years.

  • UNICEF links 55 per cent of child mortality to malnutrition

    UNICEF links 55 per cent of child mortality to malnutrition

    UNICEF said on Thursday that 55 per cent of child mortality in Nigeria was associated with malnutrition.

    Mr. Arjan de WAGT, UNICEF Chief Nutritionist, said this at the opening of a two-day media dialogue on Nutrition and Community Management of Acute Malnutrition (CMAM) in Kano.

    The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the objective of workshop is to create opportunity for media advocacy on child nutrition by sensitising journalists on nutrition crisis in Nigeria.

    WAGT said that child malnutrition was a national concern that cuts across the rich, the poor, food producing communities and it goes a long way to affect the development of the child.

    “‎Children’s nutritional status is the reflection of their overall health and it determines their developmental process, survival in life and 55 per cent of child mortality is associated with malnutrition.

    “Under nourished children have lowered resistance to infection and are more likely to die of common childhood sicknesses.

    “It is very important that the nutrient of a child at the first two years of life is highly nourishing ‎to develop the child properly,” WAGT said.

    He added that the proper nutrition of a child begins from the mother, adding that it affects all stages of life‎.

    The officer said that malnutrition results in low birth weight baby, child growth failure, low weight and height in adolescents and eventually small adult woman.

    “Poor maternal nutrition can result in disability of a baby or even a miscarriage because most important organs of the body develop before a woman realises she is pregnant,” he said.

    According to him, nutrients required by the body ‎are graded as macro nutrients and micro nutrients.

    He explained that macro nutrients were ‎needed by the body in large quantity and could be sourced from carbohydrate based food.

    WAGT added that micro nutrients were needed in minute quantities but had great effect on the body.

    The facilitator also stated that lack of iodine in the nutrition of a child could lead to mental retardation‎ and engender poor cognitive performance.

    “Nutrition has its impact on the educational performance of a child because the child has poor growth and will likely make the child lose 0.7 grades in school.

    “The child will also have seven months delay in starting school, reduction in mental capacity and adverse school performance,” said the officer.

    WAGT stressed that 80 per cent of the brain size of a child was developed within the first two years and if poorly developed could not be improved on.

    He also added that malnutrition was categorised into acute and chronic, explaining that acute is characterised by rapid weight loss and inability to grow in height irrespective of the age in chronic malnutrition.

    NAN also reports that the participants are expected to use their respective medium to advocate for urgent action in child malnutrition.

    They are also expected to engage in aggressive reportage on the nutrition crisis with focus on increasing government funding to combat malnutrition crisis at the end of the dialogue.

  • UNICEF advocates child friendly investment and budget

    UNICEF advocates child friendly investment and budget

    The United Nations Children’s Fund, UNICEF, has urged the Rivers State government to get involved in child friendly investment and planning, adding that it is the only way the future development of the nation would be guaranteed.

     UNICEF made the call yesterday in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital, during its yearly Review Meeting to implement its planned activities and also plan for 2016.

     The two-day meeting, a collaboration between UNICEF and the Rivers State Ministry of Budget and Economic Planning, had over 60 participants in attendance.

    They were drawn from Akwa Ibom Bayelsa and Rivers states.

     Speaking to newsmen, Chief of the UNICEF field officer in Enugu, Mr. Charles Nkuzi, called on policy makers to invest into the future of the nation through what he termed as child’s investment budget.

    Nzuki said the purpose of the collaboration between UNICEF and government is to bring about the desired level of development.

    He said, “In this review meeting, we are partnering with the government of Rivers State because we have work-plan for each of these three states for 2015.

    “We are looking at the progress we are making towards the implementation of the planned activities. Part of it is informing the plan for 2016, because we want to ensure that UNICEF’s support and contribution is aligned to the government‘s budgetary and planning processes.

    “We are working very closely with the government; and we want to ensure that we are able to have interventions and activities that will address the issues that were highlighted in this meeting.”

     Earlier in his address, the Permanent Secretary of Ministry of Budget and Economic Planning, Mr. Augustine Orlu-Orlu, thanked UNICEF for its concern and interventions in children and women welfare and development.

    Orlu-Orlu called on participants to avail themselves of the opportunity to articulate programmes that will enhance performance and service delivery for the well-being of children and women in the states.

  • UNICEF seeks participation in govt via U-Report

    UNICEF seeks participation in govt via U-Report

    The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) is determined to encourage and increase participation in government via its innovative SMS-based platform known as U-Report.

    With U-Report, UNICEF seeks to empower Nigerians to participate and engage in policy-making and governance. In addition, Nigerians would be able to access real time information on key social issues, it has said.

    To increase access to social change-related information and provide opportunities for participation while pushing forward U-Report, UNICEF has gone into a partnership agreement with Airtel Nigeria, a leading telecommunications services provider with operations in 20 countries across Asia and Africa.

    The agreement allows UNICEF to tap into Airtel’s mobile services to make health, education, child protection and community-focused content available to Airtel customers across the country. Through improved connectivity, more Nigerians will have free access to mobile applications and services developed by UNICEF, such as U-Report.

    The deal, according to UNICEF, will expand their collaboration across all 36 states and Federal Capital Territory (FCT). The platform, which was launched officially in Nigeria on April 29, this year, has over 400,000 registered users, making Nigeria the leading U-Report platform globally, among 16 countries that are running the same application.

    Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of Airtel Nigeria, Segun Ogunsanya, said the company is committed to empowering Nigerians and is keen on supporting programmes that will enrich the lives of its various stakeholders.

    He said: “At Airtel Nigeria, we constantly look for opportunities to excite, delight and empower our customers. This innovative partnership with UNICEF offers Nigerians a golden opportunity to transform the country and we are glad to be part of the U-Report project.”

    UNICEF Representative in Nigeria, Jean Gough, said: “UNICEF is committed to providing innovative solutions towards better delivery of services and social change. This partnership with Airtel has the potential to empower millions of Nigerians through access to information and with opportunities to help them transform their societies.”

    About 15 million text messages were sent and received through the U-Report platform while the country battled Ebola last year ahead of the official U-Report launch this year. The awareness messages and real time responses via SMS and on the U-Report Social Media platforms sent out during the Ebola outbreak were able to combat rumours about mythical remedies such as bathing with hot water and salt and taking bitter kola to cure the disease. U-Report participants were informed about how to identify the disease, and how to keep safe.

    U-Report Nigeria has sent out more than 70 polls and 25 million messages over the past year on topics such as prevention of HIV/AIDS, unemployment, maternal and child health, safety and security in schools, child protection, electricity, water and sanitation and hygiene.

    UNICEF strongly believes that through U-Report, communities can improve their standard of living and significantly contribute to transparency and accountability in the management of public affairs, which is key to the development of Nigeria.

    The support provided by AIRTEL has enabled U-Report to grow into a vibrant tool to empower Nigerians.  UNICEF looks forward to continued collaboration and expansion, striving to achieve its target of 1 million U-Reporters by the end of this year.

    To become a U-Reporter in Nigeria, text the word ‘JOIN’ to 24453, it said. It was free. To access U-Report information, see http://www.nigeria.ureport.in via a mapping infographic interface, the website shows U-Reporter responses across Nigeria to more than 50 questions over the past one year, according to UNICEF. “Poll questions on a wide range of development topics continue to be asked to U-Reporters every week, providing a deep source of real-time information on the views and opinions of Nigerians@, UNICEF stated.

     

  • WHO, UNICEF: Nigeria’s sanitation situation worsens

    WHO, UNICEF: Nigeria’s sanitation situation worsens

    Nigeria has recorded no progress in the area of sanitation in the last 25 years, a World Health Organisation (WHO) and United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP) 2015 has said.

     The 2015 report is aimed at monitoring the progress of countries towards achieving access to safe water and basic sanitation.

     It said in 1990, 38 per cent of the population had access to improved sanitation.

     In 2015, the figure is now 29 per cent, which is up just by 1 per cent from 2014’s figure of 28 per cent.

     “The proportion of Nigeria’s population that has gained access to improved sanitation since 1990 is only 9 per cent,” the report said.

    It said in 1990, 24 per cent of the population was practicing open defecation. That figure  is now 25 per cent.

     It added that in 2014, it was 23 per cent which means that Nigeria is not only worse off now than it was 25 years ago but in the past year alone, the country has regressed by 2 per cent in this regard.

     According to the report, the Federal Government has not met the national target it set to ensure that 75 per cent of its population has access to safe water by this year.

     “Nigeria has generally done better in the area of water provision and has met the MDG target for water which was to halve the number of people without access to safe water.”

     “The goal on sanitation, however, has failed dramatically. At present rates of progress it would take 300 years for everyone in Sub-Saharan Africa to get access to a sanitary toilet,” it stated.

     Reacting to the new report, the Country Representative of WaterAid Nigeria, an international agency, Dr. Michael Ojo, said that It is true that a lot has changed in the 25 years since the WHO /UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme began to document the world’s access to drinking water and sanitation.

     The picture for Nigeria, he said, has for the most part remained quite grim.

     Dr. Ojo said: “Communities without safe water and basic toilets have higher rates of illness and are held back from economic progress. Children spend long hours fetching water instead of at school desks, parents are less able to spend time earning incomes and hospitals fill with people suffering from preventable water-borne illnesses. The burden is disproportionally felt by women and girls, who are most often tasked with fetching water and who are most at risk of harassment and worse if they are without a safe, private place to relieve themselves.”

  • Airtel, UNICEF invest in social marketing

    UNITED Nations Children Education Fund (UNICEF) and Airtel Nigeria have entered an agreement  to deepen their social cause marketing investment in communities across the country.

    The deal allows UNICEF to tap into Airtel’s mobile services to make health, education, child protection and community-focused content available to Airtel customers across the country.

    Accordingly, the partnership is expected to increase access to social change related information and provide opportunities for participation whilst pushing forward U-Report, an innovative project supported by UNICEF.

    U-Report, an innovative SMS-based platform, empowers Nigerians to participate and engage in policy-making and governance and to access real time information on key social issues.

    The platform, which was launched in Nigeria in April, has over 400,000 registered users, making Nigeria the leading U-Report platform globally, among 16 other countries.

    The Chief Executive Officer/Managing Director, Airtel Nigeria, Segun Ogunsanya, said the company is committed to empowering Nigerians and is keen on supporting programmes that will enrich the lives of its various stakeholders.

    The UNICEF Representative in Nigeria, Jean Gough, said UNICEF is committed to providing innovative solutions towards better delivery of services and social change.

    He said the partnership can empower millions of Nigerians through access to information and  opportunities to help them transform their societies.