Children

Today marks the start to the Junior 8 Summit, which will be held in Chitose City, Hokkaido, Japan, from 2-9 July. The J8 is a youth event run parallel to the annual Group of 8 Summit of world leaders. The J8 takes place every year and allows young people from around the world the opportunity to meet share their ideas, concerns and recommendations on how we can work to solve pressing global issues which are set before the G8.

At the J8 Summit, a team of young people represents each of the G8 countries, which include; Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States. In addition another delegation of young people will represent the non-G8 countries, by providing one participant from each region of the world.

The J8 is an amazing opportunity for young people around the world to get involved in the decisions of our global world for which they will soon inherent responsibility for. The summit is also an opportunity for world leaders to hear the voices of youth, and see the power for which young people have for change. The participants in the J8 are to serve as representative of youth around the world, but are also able to share their own ideas.

The G8 leaders will gather in Japan next week, as the Group of Eight summit takes place on July 7-9 in the Japanese town of Toyako. On this years G8 agenda climate change tops the list as a UN-backed deadline approaches for a new global treaty. Also priorities on the G8 agenda are poverty and HIV/AIDS, as while the progress has been seen in some areas in recent years, such as providing life saving medications and increasing children’s access to schools, the increasing of promised funds to fight extreme poverty have been missed. Therefore as the world looks at the current food prices and shortages, the need for action has become even more pressing.

Kids to learn more about the J 8 Summit and how you can send a message to world leaders click here, and find your countries J8 page. Have your say and see what others are saying by going to UNICEF’s Voices of Youth forum, young people just like this:

“My country comprises of intelligent youths who when given the right environment and state of mind, the sky is just the beginning, so to improve my country, i would invest in education, improving the state of mind of the average Nigerian child and positioning him to influence the world.”

More on the issues at this years G8 Summit:

Confronting Climate Change: A Strategy for U.S. Foreign Policy
A new Independent Task Force report says U.S. climate policy must focus on the largest economies and emitters.

News Release: U.S. must overhaul climate change strategy, says CFR Task Force report.

Backgrounder: Economic Challenges for Climate Change Policy

Ban urges G8 to move forward with Africa aid promises
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged the G8 countries Monday to follow through with pledges to increase aid to Africa $25 billion. Reports surfaced that some countries might backtrack on the promises. “When it comes to climate change…and the global food crisis, these campaigns should be led by the industrialized countries — they have the capacity, they have the resources, and I hope the leadership demonstrates their political will,” Ban said ahead of a G8 summit next week.

The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has launched the second part of its multi-phase campaign to detect and treat widespread malnutrition in Togolese children. The agency is now targeting dozens of more isolated villages in the Savanes and Kara regions in the north of the West African country and the Maritime region in the far south after earlier reaching bigger population centers, according to a statement released by UNICEF June 15. (UN News Service)

Students and teachers clashed with police in Chile on June 18 to protest an education bill they say doesn’t go far enough to bring equal access to schooling for the poor even with a government flush with copper dollars. About a thousand students marched shoulder to shoulder in the nation’s capital, confronting police with tear gas and water canon in the upscale Providencia neighborhood. In Valparaiso, the port town where the national Congress is debating the controversial legislation, 10,000 teachers marched in peaceful demonstrations. (Reuters)

Chinese police have detained a retired teacher on subversion charges after she decried the state of many schools buildings that toppled during last month’s devastating earthquake, the Information Center for Human Rights said on June 18. The Hong Kong-based human rights group said police in southwest China’s Sichuan province detained Zeng Hongling for “inciting subversion” after she wrote essays arguing that corruption made a mockery of school building standards. The more than 70,000 people killed in the May 12 quake included thousands of children crushed in schools, which often collapsed even as nearby buildings stayed upright. (Reuters)

A Dutch court began hearings June 18 about whether survivors of a 1995 massacre of Muslims in Bosnia, Europe’s worst mass killing since World War II, can sue the UN for failing to prevent the slaughter. Serb forces killed more than 8,000 Muslims in one week in July 1995, overrunning the Srebrenica enclave declared a UN safe zone. Dutch peacekeepers overwhelmed by the Serbs’ superior force watched helplessly as the male victims were led away from their custody for execution. The Mothers of Srebrenica, survivors of the men and boys killed in 1995, are among those seeking compensation from the UN and the Dutch state in the civil lawsuit. (AP/MSNBC)

The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said it is scaling up its emergency operation in Iraq to address the basic needs of more than 360,000 vulnerable children inside the strife-torn nation. After five years of conflict, more than 800,000 Iraqi children are unable to go to school and only 40 per cent can access safe water, according to the agency. Through its Immediate Action for Vulnerable Children and Family - or IMPACT program - UNICEF is aiming to assist over 360,000 children this year and ensure they have access to health care and are protected against malnutrition. (UN News Service)

The work of the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) is no longer going to be only about delivering food, the former “food aid agency” announced in its new strategy for the next three years (2008-2011); it would now bill itself as a “food assistance agency”. Oxfam’s Mousseau cautioned that while his agency “welcomed” the new range of objectives and activities, “We think this new plan should not necessarily translate into more activities for WFP but rather better quality and effectiveness of WFP’s work. (IRIN)

Malaria battle gains mainstream popularity through the “Nothing But Nets” program. The program for which a mere $10 buys an insecticide-treated bed net, has united people and organizations from all walks of life in the battle against malaria and helped make charitable action a wildly popular undertaking, The New York Times reports. Supporters that have rallied to the cause include the United Nations Foundation, the National Basketball Association, the TV show “American Idol” and more than 70,000 individual donors.

A three-day United Nations food conference in Rome ended Thursday, June 5th, with calls for urgent steps to boost food production and halt soaring prices. The global food crisis overshadowed the conference, originally organized to address climate change and biofuels. Conference organizers criticized the U.S. for policies they said contribute to inflating food prices, such as subsidies for wealthy farmers and trade restrictions on food (The New York Times).

HIV rates for women decline in South Africa, as health officials in South Africa have announced that the percentage of pregnant women diagnosed with the HIV virus declined to 28% last year from the 2006 rate of 29.2%. The overall rate for women aged 25-29 infected with HIV was 37.9%, down from 38.7% in 2006. South Africa still has the highest number of AIDS victims in the world at 5.4 million.

Myanmar survivors forced to work for food, Amnesty International alleged Thursday, that the country’s military leadership is forcing cyclone survivors to work for food rations as it continues to evict them from aid shelters and camps. The situation, the group said, is not only violating survivors’ basic rights but is further endangering the lives of tens of thousands.

Child labor in Malawi encouraged by poor record keeping, as legislation compelling birth registrations has been delayed by government infighting and the resultant political turmoil. This failure to More than a million Malawian children are still being used as laborers, according to the latest available estimates. The colonial-era 1904 Birth and Deaths Act, which does not require citizens to be registered at birth, nor deaths to be reported to the authorities, is still in force. Consequently, even though Malawi is a signatory to numerous conventions against child labor, including the 1989 UN Convention on the Rights of a Child, the 1973 International Labour Organisation (ILO) Convention 138 (setting a minimum working age of 18), and the 1999 ILO Convention 182 (outlawing child labor), child protection officers cannot verify the ages of people suspected of being employed as child laborers.

This week Save the Children UK released the report, Someone that matters: The Quality of Care in Childcare in Institutions in Indonesia, the report showed that financial pressures in Indonesia are driving more families to give up their children. The report, which was launched in joint effort with the UN children’s agency UNICEF and the Indonesian government, found that of the some 500,000 Indonesian children in care institutions, only some 6% are actually orphans.

So why are so many non-orphaned children being placed into care? The problem according to the report appears to mainly be economic, and the rising food prices are only acerbating the situation. Families are finding it increasingly difficult to care for their children, not only to provide them with adequate nutrition, but also education, and thus they feel the best option for their child’s future is the mainly privatively run care system.

“Children have the right to know and grow up within their families and they also have the right to education. They and their families should not be asked to choose between these two fundamental rights”, said Save the Children’s Country Director Stephen Morrow.

In response to the report, and concerning the efforts of the Indonesian government to eradicate this large scale problem, Makmur Sunusi, Phd. Director General for Social Services and Rehabilitation in the Ministry of Social Affairs said;

“the Indonesian Government has recognized that families are the best environment for children to grow up in and this research is an important first step towards ensuring that children who are in need of alternative care are provided with professional and quality care and only institutionalized as a last resort.”

The reality is harsh and requires extensive research into alternative solutions to keep families together and see that children continue to receive a full and adequate education. Such mass scale economic abandonment will have serious future implications on not only the Indonesian economy and state, but also on the future structure and stability of the Indonesian family. The preservation of the family must be kept in as many situations as possible, and parents should not be forced to feel that the best option for their child’s future is to place them in care. At current it appears that more parents are sacrificing their children’s mental wellbeing for their economic and educational wellbeing, a choice no parent should be forced to face.

News of the global food crisis is increasingly inescapable and as the price of food continues to skyrocket around the world, those most effected are women and children. Those children who are already most vulnerable are now placed in even more danger as the food crisis continues without any visible signs of curtailing.

What is the food crisis? Are the figures really so detrimental? Globally, rice prices have more than doubled over the last year and wheat prices have risen more than 130%. Therefore at each food staple percentage point of increase, the number of persons affected by will increase by 16 million, thus leaving some 1.2 billion people chronically hungry by 2025, according to UNICEF.

Malnutrition itself is dangerous as it increases the risk of disease and early death, for example protein-energy malnutrition, is a leading cause in half of all under-five deaths in developing countries according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Severe forms of malnutrition include marasmus (chronic wasting of fat, muscle and other tissues); cretinism and irreversible brain damage due to iodine deficiency; and blindness and increased risk of infection and death from vitamin A deficiency. Malnutrition also increases the likelihood of one acquiring various infectious diseases and result in the inability to recover from such infectious diseases.

Even mild malnutrition, when combined with other diseases, can lead to death. Malnutrition is implicated in more than half of all child deaths worldwide, and thus the pending malnutrition of millions more children must be deemed as a large scale international humanitarian crisis, as the stability of many countries teeters in the balance. While many countries are scampering for new food sources amid the rising prices of rice, it is the children who are suffering most. Children are not just suffering from malnutrition, but also a lack of education, as many families are pulling children from schools, due to the inability to pay for school fees. Other families are keeping children out of school and placing them into the labor market to supplement the families income.

While the food crisis may seem like a distant cry, it is truly an emergency of immense magnitude, so much so that the World Food Program (WFP) is calling it a “silent tsunami.”

Related news:

• U.S. food waste could feed millions - The U.S. throws out the equivalent of one pound of food per person a day even as millions of families around the world are unable to put any food on their tables. U.S. authorities believe recovering even just a small fraction of the waste could feed millions of people every day.

• Global food crisis hits Horn of Africa - Several nations in the Horn of Africa are teetering on the brink of famine, according to a UN adviser. Drought, poor harvests and soaring commodity prices have created chaos in Somalia, Ethiopia and the Sudan. Aid efforts have been compromised by conflict with aid workers, banditry and overall regional instability.
  

• Research funding cuts exacerbate food insecurity for poor - Years of budget cuts to food and crop research institutions in Asia, Africa and Latin America have left scientists with the knowledge of how to protect the integrity of crops, but without the means to achieve it. Despite the growing need, The New York Times reports, budgets continue to be cut.

• UNFAO: Food inflation may be peaking

India’s child malnutrition and stunted growth problems are on the rise, and as food prices across the globe continue to rise there appears to be no sign of a slow down. India continues to come to grips with one of the world’s highest child malnutrition rates, with one third of the worlds malnourished children. The current rate only looks to increase as over 1.5 million more children are now at risk due to rising food prices according to UNICEF. The high malnutrition rate has resulted in stunted growth in about half of all Indian children under the age of five, the UN children’s agency said.

Stunted growth is not only brought on by malnutrition in early childhood, but also in the fetal development stage when the mother is malnourished. The effects of stunting are most always permanent, and stunted children may never regain the height lost as a result. In addition most children will never gain the corresponding body weight, and stunting can also lead to premature death, as vital organs are never fully developed during childhood.

News of India’s large scale child malnutrition problem is not new, as was reported in the the 2005 UNICEF report, “Childhood Under Threat”, which not only reported that; 53% of Indian children are chronically malnourished, but that 63% go to bed hungry. The report also showed that some 77 million children do not use drinking water from a tap, 85 million are not immunized, 27 million where severely underweight and another 33 million have never been to school. In 2007 the National Family Health Survey reported, the survey when compared to the same survey in 2000 only saw a marginal drop in child malnutrition rates, leaving India behind Sub-Saharan Africa.

It is all to clear that India, the worlds largest democracy, is not doing enough to save its children and safeguard their future as they continue to remain worse than that of it’s African counterparts. And with rising rice prices heavily effecting the country the severity of malnutrition across the country is only becoming more grave and harder to ignore. Many fear that school feedings, which are often the only viable source of proper nutrition for many children, will not increase as needed.

In a climate of increasing insatiability the threat of increased child labor follows closely behind malnutrition fears, and India is no stranger to child labor. Therefore it is clear that the government and aid agencies must make maternal and child malnutrition a top priority as food prices continue to rise and following food shortages ensure that malnutrition rates remain high. Thus feeding programs alone are not enough, agricultural investments and training programs must follow, especially in regards to small scale farming programs, if we are to see a significant drop in malnutrition across the state of India.

Related News:
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)/Reuters
BBC

2007 WFP/Eddie Gerald

News of food shortages are far from new and have now become a staple in the news headlines. Countries across the globe are working tirelessly to grapple with the the spiraling food costs. The Result of much of the cuts to save one country have left others in even more desperate situations, as food aid is dramatically cut. The agency set to feed the worlds poor is struggling to meet the needs of some 73 million this year alone, a substantial majority of which are children.

“Price increases have ballooned WFP’s 2008 costs from an original calculation of $2.9 billion to at least $3.4 billion today — and that doesn’t include new, unanticipated needs as sky-rocketing food prices squeeze the world’s poor”

( UN steps up donor appeal as food aid costs grow).

In response the World Food Program (WFP) has launched an “extraordinary emergency appeal”, urging governments to donate some $500 million over the next four weeks.

“We urge your government to be as generous as possible in helping us to close this gap - which stood at USD 500 million on February 25 and has been growing daily,” WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran wrote.

The appeal letter is aimed at avoiding rationing food aid, was sent to donor countries, claiming that if funds where not in hand by May 1, the effects would be hardest on those who needed it most. The food rations, would gravely impact those countries who are in the most need, and who’s people are heavily reliant on the rest of the world for protection and support.

Food costs are quickly rising, wages are not and the he harsh reality is that while food may line the shelves, the will be no one who can afford to buy it in some areas.

The number of cases of drug-resistant tuberculosis around the world is higher than ever, the World Health Organization (WHO) warned Tuesday. Eastern Europe, China and India have been hit particularly hard, the agency notes in its report, driving concerns that some health care systems may soon be overwhelmed by the potentially lethal disease.

10 UN agencies urge end to female genital mutilation, a painful and dangerous ritual still imposed on many girls in Africa, Indonesia and the Middle East. The initiative to change this tradition best comes from the inside, as evidenced by several West African villages that have abandoned the practice, the UN says.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urges General Assembly to hold special session on suicide bombings, considering them a growing threat against humanity and political stability, a UN spokeswoman said Wednesday. Ban will personally urge General Assembly President Srgjan Kerim to hold the session, the UN chief told leaders of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Jewish rights group that has pushed for the initiative.