CSPR urges government to invest in children’s welfare
CSPR Programmes Coordinator, Eddy Musosa has expressed concern that six in every ten children are poor and coming from poor households.
"In Zambia out of every 10 children, 6 are poor and coming from poor households, meaning they are unable to have access to basic needs such as food, clothing and decent housing. This problem is huge and heavier in rural areas compared to urban areas".
Speaking at a joint briefing ahead of the commemoration of this year's Day of the African Child which falls today, 15th June, 2019, Mr. Musosa says about 60 percent of children in rural areas suffer from at least three deprivations or more such as lack of access to Nutrition, education, health, water and sanitation, adequate housing among others compared to 10 percent in urban areas.
"However what is actually more saddening is that the challenge of child poverty has been downplayed by government with very little focus being given to it" He has complained.
"Blanket poverty reduction programmes which target the entire population, with very few specifically targeting programmes on children have been implemented. They have included the Social Cash Transfers. These have had very little positive impact on Children. There has been lack of urgency to address the situation", He has observed.
Mr. Musosa said, "Contributing to this has also been abuses of public funds and corruption. For instance, the recent mismanagement of the Social Cash Transfer funds in the Ministry of Community Development which could also have benefited the child headed households. The inadequate uptake results and disparity between the existing data and the formulated programme interventions with their respective targets to address child poverty should also be of great concern.
And Mr. Musosa says this is evident from lack of a clear criteria of apportioning resources for Children as a proportion of the entire social sector budget in 2019, even when evidence from the 2018 Child poverty Report by Ministry of National Development Planning meant to inform programme implementation and reporting in the 7NDP implementing tracking.
"Therefore as Zambia participates in commemorating this year's Day of the African Child, we urge government to :through its agencies conduct a child focused performance analysis as part of the mid-term review of the 7th National Development Plan from a programme perspective and also from a Budget or Financing angle over the last 2 years. We also urge government to ensure that funds meant to support key Child Focused Programmes are ring-fenced to make them immune from the negative impacts of austerity measures, in line with the Minister of Finance Margaret Mwanakatwe insistence that Austerity Measures will not disrupt but support key poverty reduction programmes such as Social Cash Transfer, Home-Grown School Feeding Programmes and Sanitation Programmes" He said.
"As CSO-SUN we are using this day to highlight the ongoing malnutrition crisis in Zambia which has led to great numbers of children suffering from widespread stunting, wasting and being underweight. This has negatively impacted the effectiveness of health services and stretching capacity to a breaking point," She said.
"The latest Zambia Health Demographic Survey shows that all the three nutritional status indices namely stunting, wasting and underweight have improved in the last five years. However there is not much change in the minimal acceptable diets as 88 percent of children do not have access to diverse diets frequently, contributing to the high rates of malnutrition. Lack of proper nutrition in children is limiting their cognitive development and learning abilities as well as making them more susceptible to illness".
Ms. Mayenda has further recommended that the Day of African child is used as platform to highlight the urgent need to strengthen the capacity of health services in Zambia to combat health risks facing children and ensure the rights of all children to have access to effective healthcare is actualized.
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