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UNICEF Says 90% of Rural Children Live in Extreme Poverty

Posted: Nate on Aug 27 | Education & Youth

In a presentation on the State of the World´s Children Report, UNICEF representative Ludwig Guendel announced that 90% of rural children in Bolivia live in extreme poverty.  The document, which was released to mark the 20th anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, also found that Bolivia had the second highest infant mortality rate of the 193 nations included in the report.  Second only to Haiti, which since 2008 has had an infant mortality rate of 72 in 1000, Bolivia has 54 deaths per 1000 children.

The UNICEF report also found that 22% of children between the ages of 5 and 14 work in some way, a statistic that represents some 850,000 children.  Findings show that 6 in 10 infants in Bolivia lack basic necessities and that children in 8 in 10 household experience some kind of physical, sexual, or emotional abuse.  In announcing the report´s findings, Mr. Guendel emphasized that, “these facts have to help us reflect on the remaining challenges and they show that Bolivia needs to assume recognition and responsibility for this areas.”

The report did find some positive change in the status of Bolivia´s children.  Child mortality, while still high, has dropped almost 44% since the period between 1994 and 2001, mainly due to new social services for pregnant women and new mothers.  The country also improved in all areas of education but the report qualified those improvements by recalling the obstacles still posed by poverty, violence, abandonment, mistreatment, and child labor.

In terms of concrete numbers, the report calculated that in Bolivia there are 2 million children who live in extreme poverty, 800,000 who work in the street, 6,000 who live in the street, 2,000 who live in pentitentiaries with their parents, and more than 32,000 who live in homes for abandoned children.

For more in Spanish see:

http://www.laprensa.com.bo/noticias/27-8-2010/noticias/27-08-2010_3030.php

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