Joyful children in school uniforms in Ninh Thuan Province, Vietnam.
By listening to children, we can fulfil their right to self-expression, understand their ideas for a better world and include their priorities in our actions today.
Photo:UNFPA Asia and the Pacific

On World Children’s Day, we celebrate the youngest members of our human family. But today is also a moment to recognize the enormous challenges children face in our deeply divided, tumultuous and often violent world.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres

For every child, every right.

World Children’s Day was first established in 1954 as Universal Children's Day and is celebrated on 20 November each year to promote international togetherness, awareness among children worldwide, and improving children's welfare.

November 20th is an important date as it is the date in 1959 when the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of the Child. It is also the date in 1989 when the UN General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Since 1990, World Children's Day also marks the anniversary of the date that the UN General Assembly adopted both the Declaration and the Convention on children's rights.

Mothers and fathers, teachers, nurses and doctors, government leaders and civil society activists, religious and community elders, corporate moguls and media professionals, as well as young people and children themselves, can play an important part in making World Children's Day relevant for their societies, communities and nations.

World Children's Day offers each of us an inspirational entry-point to advocate, promote and celebrate children's rights, translating into dialogues and actions that will build a better world for children.

 

Listen to the future. Stand up for children’s rights.

World Children’s Day is UNICEF’s global day of action for children, by children, marking the adoption of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Child rights are human rights. They are non-negotiable and universal. But in too many places today children’s rights are being misunderstood, disregarded or even denied and attacked.

Upholding children’s rights is the compass to a better world – today, tomorrow and into the future.

This World Children’s Day, join us and listen to the future.

By listening to children we can fulfil their right to self-expression, understand their ideas for a better world and include their priorities in our actions today.

Discover what’s happening and take part.

Looking for inspiration? See the highlights from World Children’s Day last year

 

Children play in a slum in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

In the aftermath of World War II, the plight of Europe’s children was grave, and a new agency created by the United Nations stepped in to provide food and clothing and health care to these children. In 1953, UNICEF became a permanent part of the UN. Today, the agency works in more than 190 countries and territories, focusing special effort on reaching the most vulnerable and excluded children, to the benefit of all children, everywhere.

 

an abstract illustration of people engaged in an event

International days and weeks are occasions to educate the public on issues of concern, to mobilize political will and resources to address global problems, and to celebrate and reinforce achievements of humanity. The existence of international days predates the establishment of the United Nations, but the UN has embraced them as a powerful advocacy tool. We also mark other UN observances.