On 29 June, Gordon
Brown delivered UNICEF UK’s Annual Lecture to
an audience of guests from
government, development charities, the media
and business, members of the UK Committee for
UNICEF, as well as participants in UNICEF’s
C8 Children’s
Forum.The Chancellor
spoke about his commitment to debt relief, increased
aid and trade justice. Mr Brown was challenged
at the Lecture by 11-year-old C8 participant
Aminata Palmer to do still more for the children
of Africa.
UNICEF
in Zimbabwe issued an urgent appeal on 24 June
for funds to continue supporting tens of thousands
of children, affected by the evictions which
form part of the Government’s “Operation Murambatsvina”.
UNICEF is currently distributing more than 25,000
litres of water each day to the displaced and
will continue providing assistance in the areas
of health care, shelter, sanitation and psychosocial
support in coming weeks.
Six months after the tsunami, tough challenges lie
ahead for affected communities, such as where
to re-establish housing and how to restore livelihoods.
Thanks to the generous response from donors,
UNICEF was able to provide assistance in the
immediate aftermath, ensuring the immunisation
of nearly 1,200,000 children against measles
and the provision of safe drinking water to
a million people per day. UNICEF has now established
plans for work over the next 2–5 years to improve
education, health care, water and sanitation
and child protection systems in tsunami-affected
countries.
Gordon Brown, Chancellor of the Exchequer, delivering the UNICEF
UK Annual Lecture.
Credit: UNICEF UK/2005/Robert Leslie
Quinton Fortune visits Johannesburg
On June 16, Quinton Fortune, a UNICEF Ambassador and
Manchester United player, travelled to Johannesburg
with UNICEF to celebrate Youth Day and visit
HIV/AIDS projects. In the diary he kept of his
trip, Quinton describes a moving meeting with
a peer education coordinator in Soweto called
Muzi. Regarding HIV/AIDS, Muzi told Quinton,
“We are dealing with this because we have to.
My grandmother had four daughters who between
them have twelve children. All four of her children
died of AIDS.”
In 2004 UNICEF
UK contributed £24.4 million to UNICEF programmes
in 49 countries. Around 70 per cent of UNICEF’s
total income in 2004 was received from fundraising
activities, including supporter donations and
legacy gifts, a further £2.4 million was raised
from the sale of cards and gifts and £632,000
from advocacy activities and Baby Friendly sales.
UNICEF UK continues to spend only 2p on administration
for every £1 raised.
