UNICEF was established in 1946 and has a presence in over 190 countries and territories with the aim of protecting the rights of children, improving lives of children and their families.

UNICEF officially started operating in Armenia in January, 1994.

Cooperation between Armenia and UNICEF started with two-year program addressing the issues stemming from the emergency situation in the country at those times. In the course of 1995-1999 the cooperation over the emergency situation issues started to transform into long-term initiatives aimed at implementation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

In 1995 the first program of cooperation between UNICEF and the Government of Armenia was signed focusing on health, nutrition, and education.

Armenia – UNICEF Program of Cooperation for 2021 (October) – 2025 (December) and Multi-Year Work Plan for 2021 (October) - 2023 (December) was adopted in 2022. Social policy, Health, inter alia, nutrition, education and child protection are the components of the Program. The Work plan envisages a humanitarian response aimed at addressing the needs of children displaced as a result of the aggression against the people of Nagorno-Karabakh and of those children living in conflict-affected communities.

UNICEF implements the following activity in Armenia;

• Works with the RA Government to improve the state of health and nutrition of children and women, prioritizing the needs of most vulnerable groups;
• Supports the RA Government in the process of making all schools inclusive and child-focused;
• Supports Armenia to ensure the access to early childhood development and learning programs for all young children;
• Supports the Government of Armenia to better fulfill the right of every child to live in a family;
• Constantly is involved in policy advocacy with the Government of Armenia and public awareness rising to enhance the understanding of the access to justice;
• Has been successful in supporting generation of child poverty data together with its partner, to be able to identify those poorest and furthest left behind, and inform policy-making;
• Has a unique role to play in ensuring that national and local budgets are responsive to child rights and needs;
• Undertakes Child rights monitoring;
• Advancing children's resilience to disasters and climate change in Armenia.

Updated on 03.03.2023