New child protective services needed

HCM CITY— A service network including childcare facilities, counseling offices and resident collaborators should be established soon to protect children's rights more effectively in Viet Nam, experts said at a workshop yesterday.

The establishment of such a network was one of the targets mentioned in the five-year National Child Protection Programme, said Dr Nguyen Dinh Ton of the Viet Nam Association for Protection of Children's Rights (VAPCR).

Although child protection had enjoyed a lot of attention by the Government and various organisations, efforts to date had not reached all vulnerable and disadvantaged children who faced several barriers in accessing welfare that was their right, he said.

Among the main reasons for this situation are low awareness in the community of children's rights and the need to protect them; as well as the lack of collaborators, officials specialising in child protection and social workers.

Collaborators were residents who worked with local officials and agencies to implement various social projects. The whole country had just 7,000 collaborators, Ton said.

Each province in the country had just seven or so officials specialising in child protection, he said, adding that the rate of social workers was one per 10,000 people, compared to one per 2,000 in developed countries.

Nguyen Van Tuyet, member of the National Assembly's Committee for Culture, Education, Youth and Children, said that the State budget allocated for child protection was relatively low compared to demand.

The General Department for Crime Prevention under the Ministry of Public Security reported that 4,353 cases of child abuse involving 4,688 children had been recorded over the last three years.

Since the beginning of this year, 1,385 child abuse cases with 1,397 victims had been discovered, an increase of 25 cases compared to the same period last year. Among these, 60 per cent involved sexual abuse, the report said, stressing that the recorded cases were likely to be lower than the actual numbers.

Tuyet noted at the workshop that more and more incidents of school violence had been noticed in recent years, adding it was an alarming trend.

Nearly 1,598 cases of school violence have been seen nationwide since the 2009-2010 school year, he said.

Schools are not doing enough to inculcate moral and ethical values among children and this has led to the increasing incidents of violence, according to the Department for Students' Affairs under the Ministry of Education and Training.

The ministry was guiding schools in reforming and strengthening the teaching of ethics as well as in providing soft skills training in dealing with conflicts and preventing violence, the department said. — VNS