Finally, Fernando points out, there is poverty. Between 9% and 10% of children in Mexico live in conditions of extreme poverty, Fernando mentions. Poverty brings lack of education, health problems and death.
We cannot allow organized crime to think that recruiting children is an advantage
Fernando Carrera, UNICEF Mexico
David Calderón, general director of the Center of Excellence at Save the Children Mexico, highlighted in an interview that today’s childhood, with the conditions that surround it, will create very resilient adults.
In the face of so many crises such as the economic, labor, environmental, housing and other crises, children are being trained to be resilient, which can be good, but it should not be romanticized. It has advantages of survival, ingenuity and immediate responses, David mentions, but he responds to the fact that companies, jobs and even government institutions do not last.
Amid so much uncertainty, adults with “short-term” thinking await the country; With so much lack of stability in multiple aspects of your life, lack of commitment will be a constant.
I mean, why am I associating with my neighbors if I’ll probably have to move next year? Why do I specialize in a job if in a few months it is likely that the company will close, or they will sell it to another and we will be fired? “Why would I commit to a relationship if that person might change their life plans in three years?”
Mexico can save its childhood, because it has been doing it for decades
Not everything is lost. David told us about the advantages and most favorable conditions that today’s children have, and that children from 30 or 50 years ago did not have.
It highlights that there are four radical changes in the lives of children in Mexico that have occurred in recent decades; cultural and political aspects, as well as legislation, that have changed.
Child labor, although not eradicated, is now frowned upon, when before it was taken for granted. “Unlike generations of the past, politically, legally and culturally, child labor is unacceptable,” says David. “That one has already been won. It does not mean that it has already been eradicated… but the social mark that child labor is negative has already been established.”
The recognition of the value of play is a very positive historical change
David Calderón, Save the Children
For many Mexicans, working during their childhood and adolescence was a normal part of their lives, preventing them from playing and learning, in addition to putting their integrity at risk.
Something similar happens with child marriage and corporal punishment, which were normalized in Mexico a few generations ago. Marriage unions for minors are already prohibited in the country and corporal punishment is classified as a crime, with legal consequences.
This does not mean that these types of violence and abuse against children no longer exist, but there are now institutions that confront, record and measure them.
The right to play is the fourth point. “Boys and girls have homework to do… play is seen as a valid activity in itself… recognition of the value of play is a very positive historical change.”
A fifth change, David points out, is mental health care. Institutions are paying attention to this aspect in children’s lives to improve education and upbringing in homes, schools and public life. The recognition of neurodivergence, for example, allows learning processes to be adjusted, taking into account the particular conditions of children.
Unlike previous generations, where play was seen as “an accessory”, something that children could do if they had free time, it is now seen as a necessity and a right. (iStock)
When comparing childhoods now with those of 50 years ago, Fernando recognizes that childhood life has been positively transformed in Mexico. Those same adversities of poverty, lack of education, health problems and violence were much worse a few decades ago.
“Extreme poverty could affect almost 25% of children, three times more than now,” says Fernando. “50 years ago, educational exclusion at the secondary and basic level reached almost 70% of children, and we also had situations of extreme violence that went unnoticed in society.” Likewise, infant mortality fell to a fifth of what it was in 1970, and malnutrition, which is still very high, reached 60% of the Mexican child population in those years.
Looking ahead to the next six-year term, Fernando sees enormous opportunities. He maintains that it is very possible to ensure that no child dies of hunger in Mexico, that the childhood obesity curve (which has grown in 30 years) finally decreases and even becomes negative, as well as expanding social security coverage until it incorporates everyone. children and adolescents, and guarantee access to secondary education.
Fernando highlights the opportunity and urgent need to classify as a crime the recruitment of children and adolescents into organized crime, which uses them as messengers, watchmen, murderers or sexual exploitation. “Creating crime is very important, because we cannot allow organized crime to think that recruiting children is an advantage… The adults who recruit them must pay and pay dearly.”
David, for his part, proposes that there be a security strategy that takes boys and girls into account, that considers that one in four children feels unsafe on the way to school.
“If you act only in military terms, as was done in the past, the situation worsens,” David mentions. “A different approach is needed that involves creating productive alternatives, healthier environments… That must be in school, in the street, in the training of all State agents. The police, doctor and teacher must have training in how to treat girls and boys.”
If in the next six years Mexico does not manage to eradicate these evils for children, it is possible to substantially reduce them, or at least that is what they believe.
Mexico can have healthy, productive, responsible and happy adult citizens, Fernando affirms that they must be given and guaranteed a better quality of life in their first 18 years. And yes it can, because despite everything, we have been doing it for 50 years.
