Spain continues to be one of the countries with the highest rates of child poverty among the member states of the European Union (EU) and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), and is ranked 36 out of 39, ha Unicef denounced. According to a report published this Wednesday by Innocenti, the research office of Unicef, the poverty rate among Spanish children increased from 2014 to 2021 compared to the rest of the EU countries.
The document, which examines the evolution of child poverty between those two years in the richest countries, reveals that in the range from 2014 to 2021 Spain remains "stable", at 28% child poverty, which leaves it in 36th out of 39, only ahead of the United Kingdom, Turkey and Colombia. Between 2019 and 2021 it is also ranked 36th, only ahead of Romania within the EU, and in 2021 it is the European country with the highest child poverty rate.
This is an "unacceptable" rate of child poverty for a country like Spain, in the words of Gustavo Suárez Pertierra, president of Unicef Spain, according to the United Nations agency in a statement. "Behind these figures are children and adolescents who cannot afford to eat meat, chicken or fish at least once every two days or fruit and vegetables daily, who live in houses without an adequate temperature, who do not have clothing, appropriate shoes or books, or who cannot participate in leisure activities or go on vacation once a year," he stressed. And he has urged not to "look elsewhere" at any minor who does not enjoy "decent living conditions."
Although Spain slightly improves its figures compared to the starting point in 2012-2014, it ranks 22nd out of 39 in the progress of child poverty, with a reduction of only 4% between 2014 and 2021, compared to the average of 8 % of the rest of the countries.
Unicef emphasizes that child poverty does not depend excessively on the income levels of countries, and cites as an example Slovenia, which has a similar income level to Spain and, however, has the lowest child poverty rate, 10%. .
In Spain, the percentage of boys and girls in persistent poverty (two or more years in poverty) is the fourth highest of the European countries analyzed, above 20% in the period from 2017 to 2019. The rate of severe material and social deprivation, which in 2022 was 10.3% and places Spain in sixth place in the EU, and child material deprivation, with the same position among European countries and 19.7% of children and girls who cannot afford at least three products or services such as new clothes, two pairs of shoes, fruit and vegetables daily, school trips or suitable books.
The analysis also reveals "huge inequalities" in poverty risks: migrant families, the Roma community, those with a disability or those who live in households with a single adult - especially a woman - are particularly exposed to poverty .
For Unicef Spain, the new legislature and the creation of the Ministry of Youth and Children are an "opportunity" to end child poverty after, in their opinion, some of the policies and social aid implemented by the previous Government, such as the increase in the minimum wage or the minimum vital tax, will not work at all "due to a lack of specific childhood information", "being limited to very low incomes" or "having limited coverage and a high level of 'no access' to aid".
"The problem of child poverty in Spain is structural, and must be addressed as such. Its reduction is possible, but it is a political decision," added Suárez Pertierra, who has demanded a "greater effort" to do so.
