As part of their collaboration, Unicef and the European Union (EU) on Tuesday launched ‘Child Rights Toolkit: Integrating child rights in development cooperation’ providing practical guidance to all donors and social actors concerned.
The guidance is on how to operationalise a rights-based, child-focused approach to development programming, budgeting, policy-making and law-making.
Unicef Bangladesh and the EU share a strong commitment to ‘promote all human rights in all areas of external action’ and to integrate children’s rights into all operational development cooperation activities.
Law Minister Anisul Huq was present at the launching ceremony, said a press release.
At the launching ceremony, Ambassador and Head of the EU Delegation to Bangladesh Pierre Mayaudon said this toolkit aims to ensure that children’s rights as well as initiatives to promote the wellbeing of all children can be effectively integrated and applied across programmes of bilateral and multilateral development assistance.
Unicef Representative in Dhaka Edouard Beigbeder said children are central to development and they are the greatest drivers for change in society and gains achieved by investments in children far exceed those in other areas.
“To achieve sustainable change, children must be our highest priority and our first call on our resources. Investment in children today yield long-term returns and benefits not only for children and their families, but also for societies in general.”
The toolkit contains over 80 innovative and easy-to-use tools in eight thematic modules covering child rights in development programming, child participation and impact assessments, child rights in governance, in crisis situations and budgeting. It deliberately looks beyond traditional child focused sectors (such as nutrition, health, and education) and includes practical guidance and readymade tools for different sectors and stages of the programming cycle.
The Child Rights Toolkit comes at a critical moment. In the context of the 25th anniversary of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and as we prepare for a post-2015 world, business as usual is not enough.
The Toolkit is useful not only for civil society partners engaged in the design or implementation of programmes with development focus but for all involved parties including state bodies. The intention is for those engaged in children’s development to be able to apply new knowledge to effectively guarantee child rights.
