Making a Difference for Children: How You Can Help

Turkey and UNICEF

With 1.5 million babies born each year in Turkey, the need to ensure that basic health, welfare and education services are maintained for this and future generations of children has never been more pressing.

UNICEF has committed its resources globally to create A World Fit for Children by working in the five priority areas of girl’s education, early childhood development, immunisation ‘plus’, fighting HIV/AIDS and protecting children from violence, exploitation, abuse and discrimination. We believe that gains for children in these five areas will contribute significantly to the full realisation of children’s rights. UNICEF and our partners in Turkey are working together to ensure that our projects and services benefit children in every aspect of their lives.

Our programmes are structured as follows:

Early Childhood Care and Development (ECD)

Focusing on children under eight years of age, their parents and families, this programme offers the best possible start in life for a child as a foundation for ensuring all other rights. The immediate benefits are child survival, healthy growth and development and less illness and disease. The mid-term benefits are improved cognitive, linguistic, emotional and social skills, readiness for school and better self-esteem.

Education

With a special emphasis on girls’ education, this programme is designed to ensure that every girl and boy completes a quality primary school education. Educated girls are in a better position to develop to their full potential and as adults, they are better able to oversee the well-being of their children. Through Child-Friendly Schools (CFS) the quality of education in primary schools will be improved throughout Turkey in order to ensure that children reach their full potential.

Protection

Children and young people are more vulnerable to being hurt, neglected, abused and exploited than adults. This being the case, protection is a universal imperative and the right of every child.

Communication for Social and Resource Mobilisation

In the community, there is a role for all of us to ensure the implementation of children’s rights. It is vitally important that we mobilise public support for the goals and objectives we share with our partners in order to promote and improve implementation of those programmes and policies which will make a difference for children.

Some of our successes so far:

• A committed drive to ensure gender parity in primary education by 2005;
• A dramatic fall in Infant and Maternal Mortality Rates;
• Child labour reduced by 50 per cent;
• Polio-free certification in 2002;

Action for the future

The challenge remains not merely to sustain the current rate of progress but to ensure the best for children at all stages of their development. By 2005 UNICEF Turkey aims to:

• Improve the quality of education and ensure that enrolment rates for girls in primary school are on a par with rates of enrolment for boys;
• Reduce the Infant Mortality Rate (IMR) from 42.7 per thousand to 20 per thousand live births;
• Reduce the Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR) by 50 per cent;
• Increase rates of exclusive breastfeeding;
• Eliminate Iodine Deficiency Disorders (IDD);
• Expand the Early Childhood Development Programme to reach 3 million families;
• Equip adolescents with the knowledge of how to protect themselves from HIV/AIDS and other STDs;
• Significantly minimise the ratio of children in need of special protection (CINSPM);
• Ensure that Turkey’s legislation is fully compliant with CRC/CEDAW;
• Respond to the needs of children and women during and after emergencies.

We need your help

We depend not only upon the cooperation and support of Governments, non-governmental organisations and UNICEF National Committees worldwide but also on individuals and private organisations -- see the Thank You page.

Use the ‘Support Us’ link at the foot of this page to make an online tax-free donation to the Turkish National Committee for UNICEF now. Alternatively, you can make a credit transfer through your bank to Türkiye İş Bankası, Çankaya Branch, Ankara, Branch No. 4238, Account No. 500.

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