Today's announcement will provide $20 million to the United Nation's Children's Fund (UNICEF) for the Birth Registration project in sub-Saharan Africa.

This initiative will:

• increase the registration of children under the age of five;
• strengthen the health information system used for planning maternal, newborn and child health interventions, with an emphasis on community-based information; and
• increase the information on deaths of children under the age of five.

The information generated through this initiative will bring more accountability to maternal, newborn, and child health efforts as planning will be better informed, interventions more targeted, and resources more appropriately allocated.

This project will also assist developing countries in sub-Saharan Africa increase the number of birth registrations by addressing access barriers, including reaching those who live in rural areas, by mobilizing community health workers in the birth registration process. The project also seeks to use innovations, such as electronic data systems (e.g. SMS-based mobile technologies), to increase the number of births being registered.

Registering children ensures they can access government services that can protect their safety and security. In 2009 the Government of Canada identified securing the future of children and youth as one of its five thematic priorities. Canada is supporting efforts to enable countries to develop child protection systems to ensure the safety and security of every girl and boy.

Improving civil registration and vital statistics (CRVS) systems across the developing world is critical to ensuring the health of newborns and children, and an important component of the Muskoka Initiative. At the United Nations General Assembly last year, Prime Minister Stephen Harper spoke to the importance of CRVS to achieving our collective MNCH objectives, particularly Millennium Development Goals 4 and 5: reducing child mortality and improving maternal health. Further discussions in this important area will figure prominently at the upcoming Saving Every Woman Every Child: Within Arm's Reach summit, where key partners such as UNICEF will be at the table.

Through its Children and Youth Strategy, Canada has championed children's rights and protection. Our efforts are integrated into all areas of Canada's work in developing countries.

Saving Every Woman Every Child: Within Arm's Reach summit

Prime Minister Harper is hosting Saving Every Woman Every Child: Within Arm's Reach, an international summit that will shape the future of child and maternal health collaborations in Canada and around the world, from May 28–30, 2014, in Toronto.

The summit will build on Canada's leadership and chart the way forward for the next phase of coordinated global efforts on maternal, newborn and child health. Participants at the summit will include Canadian and international experts on maternal, newborn and child health representing civil society, business, academia, developed and developing countries, international organizations and global foundations.

The summit will focus on the following three themes:

• Delivering Results for Mothers and Children – Determining how, collectively, we have successfully delivered results and exploring how innovative technology and operating models are saving lives.
•  Doing More Together Globally – Pushing new technologies and global partnerships to improve women's and children's health.
•  Real Action for Women's and Children's Health – Identifying concrete steps that Canada and its partners will take to ensure that mortality rates drop, nutrition improves and more children live to see their fifth birthday.

The themes for the summit were developed in consultation with key Canadian stakeholders.

Canada and the Muskoka Initiative on Maternal, Newborn and Child Health

In June 2010, Canada led G-8 and non G-8 leaders to commit $7.3 billion, mobilizing global action to reduce maternal and infant mortality and improve the health of mothers and children in the world's poorest countries through the Muskoka Initiative.

As part of the Muskoka Initiative, Canada committed to providing $1.1 billion in new funding between 2010 and 2015 to help women and children in the world's poorest countries. Canada also announced it would maintain the ongoing spending of $1.75 billion in maternal, newborn and child health programming during the same period, resulting in a total commitment of $2.85 billion.

The Muskoka Initiative succeeded in sparking international attention. In September 2010, during the United Nations Millennium Development Goals Summit, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon launched Every Woman, Every Child, a global movement mobilizing the resources of governments, international organizations, the private sector and civil society aimed at helping the world meet Millennium Development Goals 4 and 5: reducing child mortality and improving maternal health. The goal is to save 16 million lives by 2015.

In September 2013, Prime Minister Stephen Harper, together with Jakaya Kikwete, President of the Republic of Tanzania, co-hosted a UN event entitled Women's and Children's Health: The Unfinished Agenda of the Millennium Development Goals. The event, organized in support of the Every Woman, Every Child initiative, examined ways to accelerate progress on improving maternal, newborn and child health, and reducing the number of preventable deaths.

Canada is on track to meeting its Muskoka commitment, with 80 percent of the funding already disbursed. Under the Muskoka Initiative Partnership Program, Canada supported the efforts of 28 Canadian organizations to reduce maternal, newborn, and child mortality over three years in Haiti, Africa and Asia. Bilateral efforts are focused in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Haiti, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Nigeria, South Sudan and Tanzania, where maternal and child mortality rates are high. Multilateral and global partners include the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, the GAVI Alliance, UNICEF, and the World Health Organization.