Capacity Building

Capacity Building in Eastern Europe
Funders: UNICEF Geneva, Dienste in Ubersee (DU), Oak Foundation and Kinderpostzegels
Total Expenditures: 50,590 USD

Following the Mapping and Assessment Exercise carried out in 2000 for the NGO Focal Point on Sexual Exploitation of Children, this project aimed at developing local capacity to combat commercial sexual exploitation of children in 8 countries of Central and Eastern Europe: Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Slovakia.

A number of seminars were organized intending to give a focus and direction to national efforts being undertaken to deal with the issue of CSEC, to raise awareness at national and sub-regional level and to increase capacity for future work on prevention, protection and recovery of children.

Clear action plans for all countries involved were produced at the end of the seminars, attended by a total of 300 participants from private and public institutions in the region.

Support to Organisations Fighting CSEC
Funders: CORDAID, General Funds
Total Expenditures: 39,774 USD

Micro Projects
This project provides small grants to non-governmental organisations fighting CSEC in Africa, Asia and Latin America. Individual grants do not exceed 1,000 USD (only 4,897 USD were spent under this project) and an ECPAT member usually has first-hand knowledge of the project or organisation.

This year 6 organisations were assisted:

• WAO Afrique - Togo: publication of their newsletter
• Sithabile Child and Youth Care Center – South Africa: payment of school fees for 10 children
• ECPAT El Salvador: publication of a manual on commercial sexual exploitation of children.
• DEI – Burundi: donation of computers
• ONG ESAM – Benin: information newsletter for CLOSE, the local ECPAT coalition
• MAIS – Dominican Republic: set up of small businesses for families whose children are at risk of being sexually exploited in a commercial setting.

Support to Caregivers
The programme has two principal functions: to increase awareness of the special service provision needed by child victims of CSE and to support caregivers in the creation of local networks and systems that seek to reduce the vulnerability of children and ensure their reintegration.

Over the last year ECPAT International has provided direct technical support through this programme to groups in Asia (Vietnam), Africa (Tanzania, Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda, Burundi and Mauritius, during the Southern Africa Regional Consultation) and Europe (Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Albania, Czech Republic and Slovakia).

Guy Thompstone replaced Colin Cotterill as the Training Coordinator and began work at the end of July. His first mission was undertaken in February to four countries of Eastern Europe – Albania, Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia. The aim of the mission was both to plan and implement training programmes for caregivers of victims of CSEC, based on a previous situational analysis and consultation which had highlighted the need for technical support to agencies dealing directly with child victims.

Whilst there is increasing acknowledgment of the extent of CSEC in Eastern Europe, there remains a serious gap in service provision, in particular therapeutic intervention. Meetings were held with government ministers, international NGOs and local grass roots agencies working with children at risk, providing a sound understanding of some of the social and political context in which services for children operate.

A training of caregivers was held outside Prague in early April, when 21 participants from both the Czech Republic and Slovakia attend and used newly translated materials prepared for this purpose. In addition, a two-day workshop was conducted in Vilnius, Lithuania. The participants included social workers, psychologists, residential workers and a pediatrician. In Latvia, an in-depth training on the rehabilitation and reintegration of victims of CSEC was organized, and participants committed to specific actions to further develop their work.

Review of the strategy for training of caregivers and capacity building of other personnel working with sexually exploited or vulnerable children is underway, as well as the development of new training materials, in particular the production of three booklets exemplifying good practice in the rehabilitation of victims of CSEC.