Safeguarding children focal point of IIN council meeting

APPROACHES TO keep children in their families, and how to put these strategies into effect to assist with a child protection early warning system (CPEWS), number among the major issues being discussed at the 97th regular meeting of the directing council of the Inter-American Children’s Institute (IIN).

The two-day forum convened in Kingston yesterday with 18 participating countries.

Marsha Smith, minister of state in the Ministry of Education and Youth, said the ministry welcomed the opportunity to investigate ways to assist the nation’s children and their families, while also addressing risk factors that restrict children’s ability to exercise their rights.

“We are particularly grateful for the technical expertise of the IIN in helping with the development of public policy, contributing to policy design, and implementation from the perspective of the promotion, protection and respect for the rights of children and adolescents,” she said.

Smith stated that, throughout the course of the conference, which concludes today, all delegations would seek to highlight the different legislative and institution initiatives that are currently being done in their own countries that are aimed at providing additional protection and care for children.

With a keen focus on ‘Care reform in Jamaica’, the Jamaican delegation, throughout the many discussions, seeks to elaborate on current strategies that are designed to offer mechanisms for supporting children and their families and to proactively address risk factors that jeopardise children’s ability to exercise their rights.

“We recognise that, as evidenced by numerous research, institutionalisation can have a serious impact on a child’s physical and psychological development and, in the long term, lead to higher rates of homelessness, suicide and crime,” Smith said.

She said that the death rate for children with disabilities rises dramatically when they live in institutions, and that the cost of living in institutions is far higher than that for keeping children in families and providing family-based care.

“The best way to promote healthy child development is to implement effective policies that promote positive parenting practices, reduce family poverty, and increase access to nutritious food, healthcare, early childhood development, education, and economic development,” she said.

Smith also noted that maintaining children in family-based environments is of paramount importance to the well-being of children and Jamaica’s human capital development.

“To this end, the government of Jamaica, along with its stakeholders, crafted a strategic framework for maintaining children in families,” she said.

The IIN is the specialised organisation of the Organization of American States (OAS) on children and adolescents. Its purpose is to help states build public policy while also contributing to policy design and implementation for the promotion, protection and respect of children’s and adolescents’ rights.

A major organiser of the event is the Child Protection and Family Services Agency (CPFSA), which is Jamaica’s leading child protection system and a developer and advocate of child-friendly policies and programmes.

The meetings will also incorporate all the suggestions provided by the children and civil society organisations that have been consulted to further the OAS’ strategic vision through the proposed 2023–2027 Action Plan.

SYSTEMIC RISK IDENTIFICATION

Speaking on the matter of CPEWS, Smith stated that “this method of intervention within child protection systems in Jamaica has primarily relied on response-based approaches and that, applied effectively, the preventative mechanism of the CPEWS will help to reduce, if not fully mitigate, the number of injuries or deaths resulting from children being exposed to an abusive environment or suffering from psychological or mental health disorders.

“The intention is to introduce a whole system change in the paradigm from one focused on timely response to one that embraces the use of systemic risk identification, prevention and management as a means of eliminating the practice of child rights violations in Jamaica,” she further stated.

Vice-president of the Jamaica Prefects’ Association for Region Seven, Kamar Edwards, bemoaned the fact that children who are seen as the world’s future were sometimes undervalued, “not protected and treasured as you would expect the most valuable resource to be”.

As a result, he stated, in order to protect children, appropriate regulations need to be implemented and those that currently exist need to be reinforced.

“Many of our children are not being heard in their homes, schools and community. We want to see more care reform strategies and policies that promote, protect and respect the rights of children in Jamaica,” Edwards said.

asha.wilks@gleanerjm.com