macroeconomic and sector policies that guide national frameworks,
and advocating for actions, budgets and investments that contribute
to fulfilling the best interest of the child. As of 2011, 111 UNICEF
country offices are involved in social budgeting and child-friendly
public finance; 55 UNICEF country offices are undertaking analysis
of multidimensional child poverty and inequalities/disparities and
advocating policies to reduce them; 88 UNICEF country offices are
engaged in building social protection systems; and 44 UNICEF
country offices are tackling issues of economic policy reform and
children.
More recently, concerned with the implications of worsening
inequity in many countries, UNICEF is intensifying its efforts to
address bottlenecks to the realization of children’s rights. A key area
to ensure equitable outcomes for children is the lack of an enabling
policy environment. Indeed, history shows that economic policy
frameworks focusing on growth but not on redistribution have
resulted in widening inequity, which in turn is bad for long-term
growth, and that austere structural adjustments risk disrupting
essential social services, which could have largely irreversible
adverse impact on children’s survival and development, as we
demonstrated in 1987 with Adjustment with a Human Face.
This focus on equity cannot be more pertinent today, as an
increasing number of developing countries are undertaking austerity
adjustments with potentially adverse implications for equity and
children. UNICEF’s latest report, “Austerity Measures Threaten
Children and Poor Households,” finds that the scope of austerity is
severe and widening quickly, with 70 countries reducing spending
by nearly three percentage points of GDP during 2010, and 91
planning cuts in 2012. Moreover, nearly a quarter of developing
countries are undergoing excessive fiscal contraction, defined as
slashing public spending to below pre-crisis levels.
If history is any guide, planned austerity measures will risk removing
essential support to the most vulnerable when their need for public
assistance is urgent and great, thus further exacerbating existing
inequalities. It is thus critical for UNICEF and its partners to
engage in international advocacy to highlight these risks and show