Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Ending Child Poverty: Exploring Innovative National Solutions
Event Date: 30 September 2021, 07:30 - 09:00 am EDT
Register here: https://unicef.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_YuYHKx2wTlOjd3bqe7xBpw
The Government of Lao PDR and UNICEF are organizing an event to highlight the unprecedented increase in child poverty and inequality in the wake of the COVID-19 crisis, and outline the critical need to accelerate and reinforce global and national commitments for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), ending extreme poverty and halving multidimensional child poverty.
In particular, the event will focus on outlining the importance of setting child poverty baselines, targets for 2030 and highlighting the key policies, programmes and financing strategies to address child poverty. The event will provide an opportunity to showcase lessons learnt and innovative solutions that countries have adopted to measuring and addressing child poverty and raise awareness on the importance of children’s participation in developing policies and strategies to reduce child poverty.
The number of children living in multidimensional poverty[1] soared to approximately 1.2 billion in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This is a 15 per cent increase in the number of children living deprived of necessities in low- and middle-income countries, or an additional 150 million children since the pandemic hit in early 2020. Poverty deprives hundreds of millions of children of the opportunity to reach their potential. In the wake of the massive disruption by the pandemic, it is more crucial than ever that governments support poor households with children.
Check out the event flyer.
Opening Statements
H.E. Anouparb Vongnorkeo, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Permanent Representative of the Lao PDR to the United Nations
Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Permanent Representative of the Lao PDR to the United Nations Ambassador Anouparb Vongnorkeo is the 8th Permanent Representative of the Lao PDR to the United Nations. He assumed his current role on January 28, 2020 after being designated Permanent Representative by the President of the Lao PDR in September 2019. Prior to this appointment, Ambassador Anouparb was Director-General of the Department of International Organizations in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 2016 to 2019.
During his 22 years of diplomatic career, Ambassador Anouparb held various senior positions in the Government of the Lao PDR and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, including among other, Deputy Director-General of the Department of International Organizations (2011 to 2016), Director of the United Nations Division (2007-2011), having served as Deputy Director (2005-2006). Throughout his career, Ambassador Anouparb also served as Senior Interpreter for Lao Government leaders over the past 16 years and was part of the secretariat supporting former Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2006 to 2017, during which he travelled extensively to different countries across all continents and attended several major international conferences and summit meetings. Before joining Foreign Service, he worked at UNDP country office and banking sector in Vientiane.
Natalia Winder-Rossi, Director Social Policy and Social Protection, UNICEF
Natalia Winder-Rossi became the Director of Social Policy and Social Protection at UNICEF Headquarters in New York in May 2020. Here she leads UNICEF’s social policy programming at the global level and oversees the organization’s work on child poverty, social protection, public finance management for children and local governance. As of 1 July 2020, the team also anchors UNICEF’s Global Lead on Urban.
Ms. Winder-Rossi brings more than 15 years of social policy and social protection experience in global and regional roles.
From 2015 to 2020, she led FAO’s Global Social Protection team in FAO, Rome, while acting as Senior Advisor for the Rural Poverty and Resilience and Humanitarian Action Strategic Programmes.
Prior to joining FAO, Ms. Winder-Rossi was the Senior Social Protection Specialist at UNICEF’s Regional Office for Eastern and Southern Africa, leading the positioning of social protection as a priority for the region, providing technical guidance to 24 countries, and enhancing the work on HIV-sensitive social protection and resilience. She was also a Social Protection Officer in UNICEF Headquarters in New York, where she co-led the development of UNICEF’s first Social Protection Framework.
Before starting her career at the UN, she worked for the Inter-American Development Bank in education, indigenous peoples’ development and social protection, the Organization of American States, and other national development agencies.
Ms. Winder-Rossi is a national of Peru. She has a Master’s in Science in Foreign Service (International Development) from Georgetown University and a Master’s in Science in Social Policy (Research and Evaluation) from the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Speakers
Colm Brophy, Minister of State for Overseas Development and Diaspora, Ireland
Colm Brophy was appointed Minister of State with responsibility for Overseas Development Aid and Diaspora on July 1st, 2020. He is a Fine Gael TD representing Dublin South-West.
He was first elected to the Dáil in 2016. During the 32nd Dáil he served as Chairman of the Budgetary Oversight Committee which was established in 2016 to enhance the role of the Oireachtas in the budgetary formation process.
He was also a Member of the Joint Committee on Justice and Equality and the Joint Committee on European Union Affairs. Member of South Dublin County Council 2008 – 2016. Colm is a former member of the Board of the Housing Finance Agency. Colm is also the former President of the Association of Irish Local Government.
Phonesaly SOUKSAVATH, Head of Lao Statistics Bureau
Phonesaly SOUKSAVATH has a Master's Degree in Economics, from Karl Marx University, Leipzig, Germany and joined Lao Statistics Bureau since 1990. She has extensive professional experience and supervision in areas of economics and social statistics, in particular with developing Lao Consumer Price Index, National Accounts and Poverty Statistics.
She has been appointed as Head of Lao Statistics Bureau, Ranking Vice Minister level in July 2020 and she is the first ever of woman head of Lao Statistics Bureau. Under her leadership, she committed to lead the development of Lao national statistical systems in a new data ecosystem.
Neliswa Cekiso, Director, Child Protection, The Department of Social Development South Africa
Neliswa Cekiso has been appointed as the Director Child Protection of the Department of Social Development in South Africa in 2016. She holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Social Work.
Marija Ruzić Stajović, Coordinator at the Division for Social Affairs and Child Protections – Ministry of Finance and Social Affairs of Montenegro
She is the author of many reports from censuses and surveys, and co-author of Fourth Human Development and Poverty Reports. She has been assigned as the member of National Steering Committee of SDGs, National Nutrition Committee and member of National Civil Registration and Vital Statistics.
Ms. Marija Ružić Stajović is the Coordinator of the Directorate for Social Welfare and Child Protection at the Ministry of Finance and Social Welfare of Montenegro since April 2021. She coordinates activities on social policy at the national level, focusing on social and child protection. Prior to this role, she has worked as the Director of the Programme for improving capacity of civil society organizations (CSOs), government institutions and the media with the Montenegrin CSO “Juventas”.
She has over 10 years of experience and extensive expertise in social and youth policy; including managing projects on providing better access to justice for children and youth, capacity building for effective participation of youth in decision-making, active involvement of young people in the process of achieving social cohesion among others.
Ms. Ružić Stajović has a Bachelor’s degree (BSc) in Political Science from the University of Montenegro and a specialist qualification in social policy and work.
Benu Bidani, Practice Manager, Poverty and Equity Global Practice, World Bank
Benu Bidani is currently the Practice Manager of the Global Unit in the Poverty and Equity Global Practice. Prior to this assignment, she was the Practice Manager in the Poverty and Equity GP in South Asia and the Middle East and North Africa regions. She has also worked on operations, policy advice and analytical activities in Africa, East Asia and Pacific, Europe and Central Asia and the Caribbean.
She has over 25 years of experience in development, working on issues of poverty, inequality, labor markets, gender equality and distributional impacts of public policy in a range of country contexts. She holds a Ph. D in Economics from Vanderbilt University.
Moderator
Andrea Rossi, UNICEF Regional Advisor for Social and Economic Policy in East Asia and Pacific
Andrea Rossi is an economist with an expertise in development and applied research. He was previously the Regional Social Policy Advisor for UNICEF South Asia and Head of Social Policy for UNICEF Mozambique. He has also taught human rights at Catholic University of Milan, University of Essex, and was the Director of Measurement and Human Rights Program at Harvard University.
Child poverty and social protection work:
Provide strategic advice and oversight to country offices in the child poverty and social protection sectoral area in developing, implementing, monitoring and evaluating programmes of cooperation with government counterparts.
Develop partnerships with related complementary institutions to ensure increased focus on children’s rights and development issues in the social economic policy sphere.
Identify research gaps and initiate research to inform programming and UNICEF positioning within the sector.
[1] Multidimensional poverty is measured by the deprivations children and their families face in key aspects of their lives, for example in health, nutrition, education, shelter, water and sanitation.