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UNICEF issues annual report

28 February 2012 10:23 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Victoria Dementieva â€“ APA. UNICEF issued annual report The State of Worldâ€™s Children 2012: Children in an Urban World, focusing on the state of the children living in cities and towns.

â€œThe experience of childhood is increasingly urban. Over half the worldâ€™s people â€“ including more than a billion children â€“ now live in cities and towns. This report focuses mainly on those children in urban settings all over the world who face a particularly complex set of challenges to their development and the fulfillment of their rightsâ€, the report reads. â€œUrban areas offer great potential to secure childrenâ€™s rights and accelerate progress towards the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Cities attract and generate wealth, jobs and investments, and are therefore associated with economic development. Children in urban areas are often better off than their rural counterparts thanks to higher standards of health, protection, education and sanitation. But urban advances have been uneven, and millions of children in marginalized urban settings confront daily challenges and deprivations of their rightsâ€.

The report also ranks countries and territories in descending order of their estimated 2010 under-five mortality rate (U5MR), a critical indicator of well-being of children. Azerbaijan was 63rd among 193 countries in this list. Somalia, Mali, Burkina-Faso and Chad were identified as the countries with highest under-five mortality rate.

According to the UNICEFâ€™s report, 2 432 000 of Azerbaijan population (9 188 000) are under-18, and 795 000 â€“ under-five children. Annual population growth was 1.2% in 1990-2010. This figure is expected to be 0.8% in 2010-2030. Every year 182 000 children are born in Azerbaijan and under-five mortality reaches 9 000.

Youth literacy rate (15-24 years) is quite high in Azerbaijan. Number of mobile phones per 100 population are 99, internet users â€“ 36.