About us
Get to know UNICEF Jamaica
Country Programme 2017 to 2021
UNICEF’s mandate is to support the Government in meeting its commitment to fulfill the rights of Jamaican children – as enshrined in the Convention on the Rights of the Child – and in achieving national goals for development under Vision 2030.
UNICEF does this by working with a wide range of government and non-governmental partners to improve the quality and accessibility of essential services for children, the design of policies and laws intended to protect children’s rights, and the use of research and data that serves children.
Every five years, UNICEF and the Government of Jamaica enter a programme of cooperation based on a thorough situation analysis of the major issues affecting children and their families.
UNICEF provides both technical expertise and financial support to our partners based on this agreement. Under the current 2017-2021 Country Programme, UNICEF has sharpened its focus on reaching the most vulnerable children, through four main areas:
- Safety and Justice
- Health Promotion
- Lifelong Learning
- Social Inclusion for Children
The Country Programme document is guided by the country’s national development priorities (Vision 2030 and the associated medium-term socioeconomic policy framework 2015-2018) and the Small Island Developing States Accelerated Modalities of Action (SAMOA) Pathway. The programme contributes to the results of the United Nations Multi-Country Sustainable Development Framework for the seventeen English- and Dutch-speaking countries and territories in the Caribbean.
Meet our Country Representative
Mariko Kagoshima is the Representative in UNICEF Jamaica.
She has over 20 years’ experience in UNICEF. She has served as the UNICEF Deputy Representative in Honduras and Guatemala and was responsible for the overall management of UNICEF’s programmes. From August 2016, she also served as Officer-in-Charge for UNICEF Guatemala Office for one year.
Prior to that, Ms. Kagoshima has worked in UNICEF Gulu, Uganda as Chief Field Office to lead the UNICEF post emergency operations and provided oversight to the UNICEF-led Emergency Clusters. She also served in Angola as UNICEF Resident Project Officer; Afghanistan and Mexico as UNICEF Programme Officer in Education. Her expertise not only covers programme areas, but also emergency and humanitarian responses.
Ms. Kagoshima attended the University of Warwick, Coventry in the United Kingdom where she obtained a Masters with Distinction in International Comparative Studies in Continuing Education in 1996 and a BA in Letter, at Doshisha University, Kyoto, Japan in 1989.
Ms. Kagoshima is a national of Japan.
Meet our National Ambassador
Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce is the National Ambassador for UNICEF Jamaica
One of the nation’s most accomplished athletes and a passionate defender of children’s rights, Mrs. Fraser-Pryce was appointed the first national National Ambassador for UNICEF Jamaica in 2010.
In accepting the appointment, Mrs. Fraser-Pryce said, “Growing up, I had dreams that I thought were out of my reach, dreams of going to the Olympics and to University. Through my work with UNICEF, I want to help Jamaican children realize their dreams. I want to help them understand that they have rights and that those rights should be protected. I want them to believe that nothing is impossible.”
Known as the ‘Pocket Rocket’, she holds a degree in Child and Adolescent Development from the University of Technology (UTech), was awarded The Order of Distinction (OD), for outstanding and important services to Jamaica, and operates her own charitable foundation, the ‘Pocket Rocket Foundation’.
