The head of the UNICEF Office in Croatia, Valentina Otmacic, said that many children in Croatia were still socially excluded.
"For many children who live in rural areas or poor communities, kindergarten care is just a dream, and parents of a large number of children with developmental disabilities lack proper institutional help," she said.
In 2017 a new five-year cycle begins and UNICEF will try to define, in cooperation with the government, priorities regarding children for the next five years, said Otmacic.
She said those priorities were largely defined in the National Strategy on Children's Rights, and that more concrete measures were being agreed with the relevant ministries.
Otmacic said one of the main priorities would be expanding pre-school care to include more children, continuing with programmes regarding family care, and seeing to it that children did not have to be separated from their biological families.
If a child has to be removed from its biological family, it should be put in a foster family because children's homes are the last option, she said.
Attending the ceremony were government and parliament officials, including Demography, Family, Youth and Social Policy Minister Nada Murganic, Children's Ombudswoman Ivana Milas Klaric, representatives of nongovernmental organisations, experts, business people, parents, volunteers, public figures and children. President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic addressed the event via video link.