United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child has, for the first time, criticised New Zealand for its child poverty. Photo / Ron Sachs, Getty Images, File
United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child has, for the first time, criticised New Zealand for its child poverty. Photo / Ron Sachs, Getty Images, File
Opinion by Dana Wensley and Elaine Rush
OPINION
The latest observations on the New Zealand report to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child contain some good and bad news for children in New Zealand.
On a positive side— the UN Committee recognised the steps taken to introduce a framework to measure and respondto child poverty. This will be known as Jacinda Ardern’s legacy to children. The Child Poverty Reduction Act 2018 allowed child poverty to be depoliticised, and provided for benchmarking against which future governments can be held to account.
The bad news, however, is that the work to pull children out of poverty is far from done. For the first time the fact that children are going hungry in New Zealand has become an area of concern for the UN Committee.
One in six children live in households where food runs out sometimes or often due to lack of money. More worrying — food insecurity is not experienced evenly in New Zealand. No child should go hungry, and the disparity between children signals a serious concern. European children experience less hunger and hardship than others.
Over one-third of Pacific children and one in four tamariki Māori live in households that sometimes or often ran out of food.
Illustration / Rod Emmerson
Food insecurity for Māori has been linked to the wider and intergenerational impact of colonisation. The recent report from the Human Rights Commission Maranga Mai details the impacts of colonisation on the tangata whenua of Aotearoa, and details the effect on food resources and poverty outcomes.
Last year the Child Poverty Action Group’s report to the UN flagged the growing hunger experienced by children in New Zealand.
While the latest Child and Youth Wellbeing Strategy Annual Report states there was a 26 per cent decrease in food insecurity for children, this figure does not explain the increased demand for the services of food banks and was before the cost of food went up by 11 per cent and vegetables and fruit by 23 per cent in one year.
Issues with access to nutritious, affordable food have been exacerbated by Covid-19 and inflation, despite the Government contribution to community food distribution and free school lunches and reduced fuel prices.
The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child has now called attention to disparities, stating in its recommendations just released that it is “seriously concerned that a significant proportion of children live in poverty and experience food insecurity”.
These observations are not new to those of us working in the field of child poverty, but it must be an important wake-up call for this and future governments. Soaring food costs and long-term effects of Covid-19 on the economy are barriers to children getting the healthy food and nutritionally balanced meals, every day, that they need to develop and thrive.
Food insecurity is associated with malnutrition — which includes hunger and undernourishment, micronutrient deficiencies, and obesity. We need a broad look at food insecurity in New Zealand.
Community-led approaches should be explored. Organisations like the Auckland City Mission spearheaded a new initiative that involved offering seedlings in food parcels to encourage a new way of supporting families with practical skills to grow kai. The Mana Kai Initiative explores the food system by taking a Te Ao Maori approach. It notes that New Zealand has a unique food system for a developed country, in that it plays a key role in nourishing those who live here, but also contributes to economic prosperity.
The need to balance these two realties is the challenge that any government faces.
In the wake of the UN Committee recommendations, it is time to focus the discussion on children going without food.
While we acknowledge any government needs to balance competing concerns, let’s put ending children going hungry as our number one priority.
Material hardship means going without things like vegetables and fruit, sources of protein such as meat, heating in the home and warm clothing.
One in nine (125, 700) NZ children live in households that experience material hardship.
One in 20 children live in households that experience severe material hardship.
- Dr Dana Wensley is a researcher for the Child Poverty Action Group and Professor Emeritus Elaine Rush, MNZM, from AUT is scientific director of the New Zealand Nutrition Foundation.
