A sad holiday

On June 1 Azerbaijan and the whole world celebrates one of the most important holidays - the International Children's Day. Concerts, drawing contests will be held today in all schools and children's institutions. Museums and entertainment centers will show films, there will be exhibitions, festivals for children.

This holiday is joyful and sad at the same time. It's great that our children are healthy, live in peace and prosperity (not all of course), but it's sad that so many have to be protected from a cruelty and injustice of adults.

Children - a special socio-demographic group of the population, by its nature the most defenseless and poorly protected. At the same time, it is a social barometer that reacts sensitively to economic, political, social changes in society.

More than 2.5 million children live in our country. The legislative base in this sphere allows to regulate the activity of the system of patronage of the children's population. Positive aspects include the annual vaccination of children, clinical examination of children, the establishment of the Republican Thalassemia Center, and some projects for inclusive education for children with disabilities.

Perhaps, that is all. There are enough unresolved problems in the field of protecting the rights of children in Azerbaijan. Let's start with a shortage of places in kindergartens. In the country, only 20% of toddlers from one to five years old receive preschool education. This is a very low level of attendance compared to other countries. For example, in the US preschool education covers 69% of children, in Germany - 96%, in Belgium and France - 100%.

The reason for this situation is that the state no longer builds kindergartens, giving this segment of the construction market to the business, which in turn, redirected the privatized object to a different destination. The average Azerbaijani family cannot afford private preschool institutions because of high prices. Another problem is the organization of summer schoolchildren's holiday. It has become clear that for many years the Ministry of Education has not puzzled itself with this work, considering its prerogative only the preparation of textbooks, the organization of the educational process in schools, the certification of teachers, etc. This issue could be addressed by the Ministry of Youth and Sports, but the agency distances itself from the current problem, concentrating on the Olympics and the Formula. The same is true about the State Committee for Family, Women and Children.

The Confederation of Trade Unions of Azerbaijan can organize Holiday for schoolchildren in Baku only in four camps - in Nabran and Shuvelan. A little more than 2400 children can improve their health during the season.

Another topic is the State program on the transfer of children from children's institutions to families (de-institutionalization) and alternative care. Ten years have been allocated for its implementation, from 2006 to 2015. The program provided for a whole range of measures aimed at reducing orphans living in orphanages, as well as reducing the number of orphanages and boarding schools themselves. In addition, it was envisaged to simplify the adoption process, improve the system of searching for trustees, monitor the lives of children who have found a new family, and provide social assistance and support to such families.

According to the head of the NGO "Reliable future" Kamal Ashumova, the deinstitutionalization program, alas, did not bring the expected results. Within the program, only a few hundred children were transferred to the family, and this is very small. There are approximately nine thousand orphans in the country"s orphan houses. Most of all children deprived of parental care live in the orphanages of the capital.

"The approach to the problem of abandoned children is incorrect. Prevention of social orphanhood is to support poor families, to provide parents with a stable income. In this case, they will not give the children to the care of the state. Another important issue is that there is no institution for foster families in which orphans can live and be brought up to adulthood. It is necessary to create a legal framework and determine the amount of the allowance for the child. These tasks remained unresolved," said Ashumova.

Is it really impossible for the government to organize summer children's recreation centers, material support for poor and foster families? It is well known that any manat invested in human health pays off repeatedly, especially when the question is the health of children.