UNICEF pledges USD50Mn for Sri Lanka’s children over next four years: Harsha

Jun 14, 2017 (LBO) - Sri Lanka's Deputy Minister of National Policy and Economic Affairs Harsha de Silva said that the United Nations Children's Fund, UNICEF, has agreed to pledge US 50 million dollars for childhood programes over the 2018-2022 period. The deputy minister made these comments after discussions with UNICEF's South Asian and Sri Lankan team leader Tim Sutton in New York recently. It will now go to the UNICEF board in September and hopefully be approved, the deputy ministers office said in a statement . The funding will focus on early childhood programs to get kids into preschool programs, middle childhood issues with respect to quality and relevance of education and adolescent issues on ensuring access to achieve full potential and deal with violence against kids. De Silva also met with officials of the Millennium Challenge Corporation's Fatema Sumar and Caroline Nguyen and  discussed at length the issues Sri Lanka need to address with regard to disbursement of a grant from the Corporation running into several hundred million dollars. "We discussed at length the issues we need to address to process the project at the earliest. I will take steps to expedite it," he said. "This is a grant to the Sri Lankan people by the American people. The biggest grant ever by any country."