Brazil and UNICEF join to end child prostitution.

In Brazil, child prostitution is a widespread phenomenon and it permeates all social classes. Efforts to call attention to the problem have focused upon the areas of greatest prevalence: the gold camps of the Amazon region; the port area of Santos; and the tourist attractions of Rio de Janeiro, Salvador, Recife and Fortaleza.

There are no reliable statistics on the number of children and adolescents engaged in prostitution in Brazil. Some of the figures presented are scandalously and outrageously high; at the end of the 1980s, the estimated figures were of 500,000 underage prostitutes and, according to the Jornal do Brasil newspaper, the Government of the State of Para estimated that there were 30,000 child prostitutes between the ages of 11 and 15 years in the State of Para alone.

Interventions carried out so far have mostly been of a demonstrative and have not significantly reduced the numbers relating to child prostitution in Brazil. The challenge at the present time is to qualify the interventions currently underway in the areas prevention, education and assistance for children and adolescents who have been sexually exploited, and strengthen other actions which contribute to breaking the vicious circle of impunity which protects the perpetrators of sexual abuse against children and adolescents. It is, at the same time, of crucial importance that a contribution be made to expanding the educational and social assistance available for girls and boys who have been victims of sexual exploitation, both in areas of prevalance and other regions where the situation is rapidly deteriorating.

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) Brazil has been supporting projects fighting child and youth prostitution since the early nineties, in a limited way, considering the magnitude of the problem.

The project activities developed and carried out so far, together with governmental institutions and non-governmental organizations in the city of Rio de Janeiro, State of Rio de Janeiro, Santos, State of Sao Paulo, State of Cera, Olinda, State of Pernambuco, State of Maranhao, State of Para and Brasilia DF, aim to: provide legal/psychological and medical assistance to the victims; support the families of the victims; support the families of the victims through income generation and job training projects; promote prevention campaigns and raise the awareness of the society about children and adolescents basic rights; contribute to eliminate gender disparity by parents, teachers and workers; and support the legal prosecution of abusers.