UNICEF recommends Gov’t financially assist children in poverty

The United Nations Children’s Rights and Emergency Relief Organisation (UNICEF) recommends the Georgian Government to give out monthly cash benefits to the tens of thousands of children living below the poverty line.

This opinion was shared to the journalists by Georgia’s UNICEF representative Sascha Graumann after he visited Parliament to discuss the progress made since the country implemented new laws on child protection.

"This meeting is another chance to draw public attention to the problems that people face in Georgia and unfortunately there are many problems,” he said.

"Currently 50,000 children live in poverty in the country. That is why decisive and immediate measures should be taken to ensure that these children are brought out of poverty. We have a recommendation that additional cash benefits should be introduced, which by our estimations, will reduce child poverty,” Graumann noted.

The UNICEF recommendation envisaged a minimum financial benefit of 30 GEL per month for children in these conditions.

"By our estimations, the state needs approximately 20 million GEL to help the poor children. We cannot allow children to be in a more serious state of poverty than other groups of society, such as pensioners and others. If children live in poverty, later they continue to live this life so we need to get them out of this situation immediately. Therefore it is very important to provide them with cash benefits,” he said.

Today’s discussion in Parliament was attended by Government and civil society representatives.

The session was dedicated to the 25^th anniversary of the children’s rights convention, which was celebrated annually on November 20 around the world.