Makes great sense to me! And while my baby days are over, I think it's a concept worth taking a look at seeing as our children ARE our future.
While we are far more advanced than many other countries in plenty of ways, Canada stands a lot to learn from countries like Finland when it comes to child rearing. A news headline caught my eye the other day. It read "Why Canadian babies should sleep in cardboard boxes like Finnish babies do." Hmmm...
Not technically to be taken literally, apparently in Finland, every expecting mother receives a cardboard box filled with goodies. On the box it reads, "Every child matters. Every family matters." The Finnish government believes allowing children and families to wallow in poverty is socially and politically unacceptable. And isn't it? They recognize the fact that there is a cost to proper child rearing and that society will better benefit as a whole if children are raised in a healthy environment. To that end, they allocate funding for important family support networks in the range of health care, childcare, education, housing and employment.
And it all starts with a box.
Each box (a gift from the state) contains clothes, a snowsuit, bath products, cloth diapers, books (including relevant information on breast feeding), bedding and a mattress. The box isn't just handed over either. To collect, moms visit a maternity clinic where they also receive fresh foods, support and even a home visit. All moms get nine full months of maternity benefits - whether they work or not. Day care is also provided at no cost and parents who choose to stay home, are paid a subsidy.
And apparently the theory is working. According to statistics Finnish moms are among the world's happiest mothers. But guess what? Canadian moms rank 20th on the list. While rewarding, raising a child can be a stressful and costly experience, especially if you are struggling and alone. We do have support networks here in Canada, if you search them out, but it seems to make more sense to have things readily available, with no searching or questions needed.
They say it takes a community to raise a child. Maybe it takes a country to do it even better. And it can all begin with a cardboard box - a symbol of commitment and a statement that every child and every family really do matter.
