He is my father - recognize this right!

Around one third of families in the state of Pernambuco, north east Brazil, are headed by women with little or no support from the father of their children. A mother cannot ask for child support if the child’s father is not registered.

To help, Plan with its partners Unicef, the State of Pernambuco Public Prosecutor, the Association of Public Notaries, the Justice Tribunal, the State Human Rights Secretary, and three municipalities organized the campaign 'He is my father: recognize this right'.

The campaign aims to guarantee a child’s right to know their father. The campaign has set up centers where men, women and children can come and recognize their paternity on the spot. Normally this would be a very time consuming and expensive bureaucratic process costing US$50 per child — but the new centers provide this service free of charge, giving children access to rights and services they were previously denied.

In focus: Solange’s family
Solange is 25 years old and has 3 children. She lives in Peixinhos, a poor urban community which is part of the metropolitan region of Recife. The father of her children is a fisherman who never had the opportunity to recognize his children. With an income of less than $2 a day the couple could not afford the $150 it would have cost to obtain documents for their children.

Thanks to our campaign, the family now has their documentation at no cost, which means the children can now receive state support should something happen to their father or their parents separate.

To date our campaign has successfully registered more than 1,700 fathers of children.

Now we are looking to expand the campaign to the rest of the state of Pernmabuco, where many of the 4,600,000 inhabitants live in poverty.

Learn more about Plan's work in Brazil.