Issue
UNICEF Romania works to ensure that an increasing number of children who are deprived or abandoned can receive quality care by promoting the development of preventive community-based services and the designing of vital elements within the country’s legal framework
Prior to 1990, institutions and policy-making capacities in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CEE/CIS) were weak. Specifically, most of the current child protection systems in these countries focused on institutional care as the main solution to family vulnerability. Consequently, state budgets and financial resources were allocated primarily for the reform of a “system of institutions” used for child placement to mitigate family vulnerability to exposure of risk situations.
UNICEF Romania’s strategic focus with partners has been to promote change in the child protection system from over-reliance on institutions to responsibilities and accountability based on child rights and the child’s best interest. Significant progress and rapid improvement in Romania has been visible notabily in areas in which UNICEF contributed to the promotion of reform: initial assessment of the system, assistance for the design of a new legal framework, including support for decentralisation.
