"Time Out:" That was the theme of UNICEF's conference on violence against Belizean children -Time out to talk about the issue and to find solutions. Today at the Radisson the coordinators presented a public awareness strategy that they believe can help reduce the rate of violence against children. They presented a communication strategy which will create awareness through videos and media. That means they aren't going into schools or homes, but according to UNICEF representative Ivan Yerovi, it is step in the right direction.
Ivan Yerovi, UNICEF Representative
"The idea of UNICEF is bringing this pieces of communications, some videos, that we want the media to broadcast, to make sure the message gets to the families in Belize and gets to the entire population about those situations that are affecting children. We know that it's not enough, one video is not going to change the entire behavior regarding violence, but for us it's a start. Today, we are presenting... the entire communication strategy, what are those communication materials that we are going to be producing in the following weeks. So far we have two videos that we are going to share today. We want to produce 6 videos demonstrating what are the kind of situations that are affecting children. For instance, the video on gang violence, a video on verbal abuse. We are currently producing a video on sexual abuse. So, those are the messages that we are going to convey to the community."
Luwani Cayetano, Child Protection Officer, UNICEF
"The child protection program is about ensuring that is a protective environment for children in Belize and so that requires a variety of different things. In our program we look at legislative reform, we look at strengthening the judiciary and strengthening the programs there, we look at capacity building, so training social workers, training judges, training magistrates and then of course also ensuring that people go into schools, people go into households and provide awareness; what is child abuse? What is exploitation and how do you get services. So that's the kind of work that we are doing."
This process extends to December 2016.
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