(Paris) The war in Ukraine, and the resulting rise in the cost of living, have pushed millions more children into poverty in Eastern Europe and Central Asia in recent months, warns a study by the United Nations Fund for Children (UNICEF) published on Monday.
Posted at 8:15 p.m.
In these regions, “the war in Ukraine and rising inflation have pushed an additional four million children into poverty, an increase of 19% since 2021”, says this study, which underlines that children bear the most heavy burden of the economic crisis caused by the conflict.
While children represent 25% of the population, they account for nearly 40% of the 10.6 million additional people living in poverty this year, details this study covering 22 countries.
Notably, Russia, with 2.8 million additional children entering poverty, concentrates almost three quarters of the total increase measured by UNICEF. Two factors explain this situation: Russia has a large population and UNICEF estimates that the country’s GDP will fall by 8%, the second largest drop among the countries included in the analysis.
“The repercussions of the conflict in Ukraine are extremely important in Russia, because the war leads to degraded access to a certain number of basic products, to fuel or simply to a correct purchasing power due to inflation”, specifies to AFP Adeline Hazan, president of UNICEF France.
For its part, Ukraine is home to half a million additional children living in poverty, which places it second, followed by Romania with 110,000 additional children, the study notes.
“UNICEF is raising a cry of alarm over the consequences of this war and calling on governments to provide extremely strong support on social protection and to implement cash assistance programs for the most vulnerable families with children. “, pleads Mme Hazan.
Because the consequences of child poverty go far beyond the sole framework of the financial difficulties of families: the poorer a family, the greater the share of its income devoted to basic necessities such as food and fuel.
And when the cost of basic commodities soars, the money available for other needs such as health and education dwindles. As a result, the poorest children have less chance of accessing essential services and are more exposed to violence, exploitation and abuse, explains the UN organization.
Rising child poverty in Eastern Europe and Central Asia could lead to the death of 4,500 more children before their first birthday and lead to learning deficits in 117,000 more children dropping out of school in 2022 alone, warns the UNICEF.