“Tales to Awaken” is the name of the campaign that seeks to make visible the situation of vulnerability in which children and adolescents live in Chile, which has become a product of the pandemic, and raises the need to establish a Social Protection Floor for children to ensure their basic rights. This initiative is in addition to the The Other Social Distance campaign, held last August.
The campaign is promoted by the Ibero-American Centre for the Rights of the Child (CIDENI), Colunga, Unicef, the Home of Christ and the Millennium Core for the Study of the Course of Life and Vulnerability (MLIV) is part of the Nacer and Grow in Poverty research in Chile that these institutions are carrying out.
The name of the initiative alludes to traditional stories that are read to girls and boys before going to sleep to convey tranquility and induce sleep. However, this series of four stories is aimed at raising awareness among adults and adults about the effects on the lives of girls, boys and adolescents (NNAs) living in poverty and vulnerability.
Each story addresses social and economic issues that affect the development of childhood and adolescence. Everyone is calling for creating a Social Protection Floor that guarantees NNA universal access to health, food, education and housing.
Basic rights
Unicef’s deputy representative, Sayo Aoki, explained that this campaign wanted to show in a different way the reality of many children, adolescents and their families and how Covid-19 had deepened poverty. “We believe that the country has the capacity to create a Social Protection Floor for children and adolescents that guarantee their rights and prevent future violations,” he said.
“Tales to Awaken” seeks to promote a response that the country can deliver to secure basic rights to NNA that are in poverty. This response would be the creation by the State of a Social Protection Floor, that is, the implementation of a social protection system for children, setting the untransable minimums for every NNA living in Chile.
The head of Home Development of Christ, Claudine Litvack, and who participates in the research “Born and Grow in Poverty in Chile” carried out by this alliance, argues that “it is unacceptable that in our country the rights of thousands of children and adolescents will be violated by poverty. In Chile we can implement a social protection floor that allows them to develop fully in education, health, housing and other basic rights”.
In addition, the impoverishment of the pandemic that has led more than one million families to join the Social Register of Homes of the Ministry of Social Development and Family, seeking help from the State for their livelihood, reaching 6.4 million households. In addition, 2.5 million families have seen their living conditions improved, many of them because of job losses and lack of social protection.
For the Executive Director of Fundación Colunga, Arturo Celedón, “it is everyone’s responsibility to take care of the situation of children and adolescents in poverty and vulnerability. We must seek solutions together that help children in Chile have the possibility to develop their capacities to the fullest and not be truncated, only because of where they were born.”
Finally, CIDENI executive director Ester Valenzuela explained that “we wanted to tell stories to capture people’s attention, stories that have no happy endings just to make public awareness that children have rights that the state must guarantee and can be demanded.”
More about the stories
Sleeping figures, addresses the lives of nearly one million children and adolescents living in poverty and vulnerability. It is noted that Chile is the country with the greatest child poverty among those that make up the OECD.
Blanca and her seven hermanit@s, refers to the overcrowding situation affecting more than 700,000 children and adolescents and the impact it has on their lives: stress, poor school performance and deterioration in their mental health.
Pedrito and the fierce lobby, recounts thechild poverty that will occur due to the pandemic and alertness that in Latin America could increase by 22% and 15% globally.
The Little Princes and the Little Princes, tells of children who live in isolation and who begin their schooling late, which delays their development and negatively affects their learning. All this increases the risk of precarious adulthood work in the future.
Information about the campaign is available at www.laotradistanciasocial.cl
