Family support services to be developed in Kazakhstan ? Minister

ASTANA. March 30. KAZINFORM /Muratbek Makulbekov/ Today during the government hour in Majilis Kazakh Minister of Education and Science Zhanseit Tuimebayev made a report on the course of implementation of ?Children of Kazakhstan? program for 2007-2011; Kazinform reports.

About five million children under 18 live in Kazakhstan, the Minister reported. 148,000 of them are children with disabilities. Over 46,000 are orphans and children without parental support. About 18,000 children are raised in disfunctional families. Annually parents of 1,000 children lose their parental rights. ?Every of these children has the right for care and support from the government, parents and society?, Tuimebayev said. According too the Minister, KZT, 10.5 bln were allocated for implementation of ?Children of Kazakhstan? program, including KZT 2.5 bln from the national budget. Orphanage is a serious problem of the present day, Z.Tuimebayev emphasized. About 15,000 children in Kazakhstan are orphans. Therefore, detection of disfunctional families and children's ill-being is the main objective in prevention of social orphanage. More than 2,500 social care teachers have been involved in schools as part of orphanage prevention work, the Minister said. ?Jointly with the UNICEF two family support services have been introduced in South Kazakhstan and East Kazakhstan regions in order to reveal difficult families", the Minister added. In future the Ministry of Education and Science jointly with the local executive bodies plan to develop an expanded network of such services on the account of public order.