At a glance: Paraguay

Background

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This map does not reflect a position by UNICEF on the legal status of any country or territory or the delimitation of any frontiers.

Despite political instability in Paraguay, the Code for Children approved in mid-2001 is being implemented and, with considerable UNICEF involvement, the new Secretariat for Children and Adolescents (SNIA) was created with ministerial rank. The Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) was approved by Congress, the International Labour Organization Convention on Eliminating the Worst Forms of Child Labour was approved, and the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on Child Soldiers was signed. However, no progress was made on issues such as the reform of the State, decentralization, or other reforms essential to better services for children and women.

Negotiations with Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention led to a major donation for a massive measles/rubella immunization campaign. PAHO has supported the introduction of the "pentavalente" vaccine (against five major childhood killer diseases, namely diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough, hepatitis B and influenza hemophilius).

A major public campaign on early childhood development mobilized families to improve early childcare practices. UNICEF participated in the proposed National Plan of Initial Education, being elaborated with support from Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the World Bank. Major campaigns on eradicating child labour, child soldiers and on the situation of adolescents in prisons were carried out in 2002. HIV/AIDS actions suffered from a lack of cash for therapeutic drugs and insufficient information, in particular for adolescents.

The current economic crisis is reducing the already weak capacity of social services to offer effective protection of child rights. The crisis is forcing more poor children to work in family agricultural production, heavy labour, as street vendors or in prostitution.

UNICEF priorities

Specific objectives include implementing the pending Code on Children and Adolescents; consolidating democratic institutions with a focus on child rights, especially at sub national levels; developing national public policies that include an equitable distribution of public expenditure to cover basic social services; promoting a civil society capable of recognizing, practicing and defending child rights; strengthening Paraguayan families and communities to provide a better context in which child rights are recognized and practised; and reducing disparities and social inequities.

UNICEF will pursue its objectives through two programmes.

The child rights and public policy programme will focus on establishing child rights as a central element of all public social policy. Nationally, the programme will seek to ensure that children's and women's rights are recognized and fulfilled, that service delivery and rights-monitoring systems are strengthened or established, and that the 20/20 Initiative is implemented.

At the local level, institutional knowledge and capacity concerning children’s and women’s rights will be enhanced, particularly through the new Municipal Departments for Children. Another important intervention is improvement of local capacity to plan and implement activities to benefit children and women (including municipal plans of action), to monitor key rights indicators, and to help develop an effective referral system for children and women whose rights are abused. Technical assistance will be provided to strengthen selected institutions, especially to improve capacity for planning, monitoring and evaluation.

The community empowerment and basic social services programme will seek to benefit poor and excluded families and their communities, especially indigenous children and women and monolingual Guarani speakers. Efforts will focus on advocacy and training, to help build the capacity of counterparts to deliver more appropriate and user-friendly services to the poorest and most vulnerable children and women. Support will also be provided for designing and disseminating materials, and implementing social mobilization activities to help create a more informed and vocal demand for services.

Special attention will be given to making health, education and social services more culturally accessible and appropriate to excluded elements of the population. Other interventions will include research to identify successful models and to make this information available to the departmental and national level for replication. Substantive areas of focus will include perinatal infant mortality, early childhood care and development, maternal health, breastfeeding and micronutrient malnutrition, water and sanitation, primary health care, and quality primary education.