Innocenti Working Papers

Accumulated evidence from dozens of cash transfer programmes across the world suggest that there are few interventions that can match the range of impacts and cost-effectiveness of a small, predictable monetary transfer to poor families in developing countries. These results lead many policymakers to consider cash transfer programmes the ‘gold-standard’ in anti-poverty policy with some even advocating for benchmarking all development interventions against what would have been accomplished with a direct cash transfer. However, the benchmarking argument rests on the accumulated evidence from many programmes that highlights the range of potential benefits of cash transfers, while each individual study typically focused on only one programme and one outcome. This article is the first to provide comprehensive impact results of an unconditional cash transfer from one programme, covering many outcomes in poverty, social and economic domains. We implement an experimental design to evaluate the Zambian Government’s Child Grant, an unconditional cash transfer to families with small children in three of the poorest districts of Zambia. We document the broad impacts of the programme, including on consumption, livelihood strengthening, material welfare of children, young child feeding, investment in assets, productive activities and housing after two years, making this one of the first studies to demonstrate both protective and productive impacts of a national unconditional cash transfer programme. However impacts in areas such as child nutritional status and schooling depend on initial conditions of the household, suggesting that cash alone is not enough to solve all constraints faced by these poor, rural households. Even an unconditional cash transfer programme with a wide range of impacts does not produce effects for all outcomes, suggesting that complementary programmes to achieve specific outcomes will still be necessary even in the most successful cases.

During the late 2000s, European countries were affected by an economic crisis considered the most severe since the Second World War. Although the nature of the shock and its evolution were different across countries, the reactions of governments were quite similar. Indeed, governments implemented stimulus fiscal packages in the early stages of the crisis; nonetheless, the worsening of economic conditions plus the pressures coming from financial markets pushed them into a process of fiscal consolidation. This paper shows that these different policy reactions provoked important consequences for people’s living standards. If the increase in social transfers and the reduction of the tax burden partially compensated the drop in private income over the period 2008-2010, the implementation of the austerity packages amplified the negative consequences of the economic recessions. Moreover, the policies implemented by governments during the austerity period deepened inequality. In some countries – such as Estonia, Greece and Spain - the burden of the adjustment fell on the bottom of the distribution producing a deterioration of living conditions for the most vulnerable. Lastly, government interventions worsened the conditions of the poorest children in countries such as France and Hungary.

This initial exploratory study examines the governance and finance of ECS in three countries using an in-depth qualitative approach. The methodologies and tools provide an innovative strategy built upon the literature of governance and finance to understand how to improve access, quality and equity of ECS. Cross-country analyses reveal key emerging trends in ECD systems governance at different levels and around crucial dimensions, including actors, coordination, policy architectures, and local-level perspectives. The findings of this study have implications for strengthening systems of global ECD systems research.

Hungary and Iceland were among the countries most affected by the recent macroeconomic shock. Although they suffered a similar GDP drop and started from much the same fiscal conditions, their respective governments decided to follow different strategies of adjustment. Each country cut public spending according to different priorities. However, the most important differences are related to the revenue side. While the Hungarian government implemented a flat tax reform, the Icelandic government replaced the previous flat tax system with a progressive one increasing the participation in the fiscal consolidation process for high income groups. These two opposite adjustment strategies produced different economic and social outcomes. In both countries, the primary balance turned positive and the level of debt on GDP started to decrease. Nonetheless, while Iceland fully met the objectives of the IMF programme, the worsening of economic conditions forced the Hungarian government to ask for additional help from the EU and the IMF in 2012. In terms of distribution, social transfers contributed to reduce inequality in both countries, while the different tax strategies operated in opposite ways. Indeed, the results show that the Hungarian tax system became more regressive while the 2010 Iceland’s Tax Reform contributed to reduce inequality by nearly two points.

The risk and time preferences of individuals as well as their subjective expectations regarding the future are likely to play an important role in choice behaviour. Measurement of these individual characteristics in large-scale surveys has been a recent development and empirical evidence on their associations with behaviour remains limited. We summarize the results of measuring individuals’ attitudes towards inter-temporal choice, risk, and the future in a large-scale field survey in Kenya. We also examine the impact of a cash transfer programme on these preferences and expectations. We find very low rates of inconsistency in interpreting questions on time and risk preferences. Cash transfers alone do not appear to impact time discounting or risk aversion, but they do have an important impact on subjective well-being measures and on future perceptions of quality of life. These in turn may affect forward-looking decisions such as financial and human capital investment, although this is not explored in this paper and remains part of the future research agenda.

The Multiple Overlapping Deprivation Analysis for the European Union (EU-MODA) compares the material well-being of children across the EU member states, using data from the child material deprivation module of the European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) 2009. Embedded in the multidimensional poverty measurement literature, EU-MODA applies internationally accepted standards for the construction of indicators and dimensions of child well-being. The analysis ranges from indicator and dimension headcounts, overlaps between several dimensions, decomposition of the adjusted multidimensional deprivation headcounts, to overlaps between monetary poverty and multidimensional deprivation. This technical note describes the EU-MODA methodology in detail.

Children living in urban slums in Dhaka, Bangladesh, often have poor access to school and attend different types of school than students from middle class households. This paper asks whether their experiences in school also disadvantage them further in terms of their learning outcomes and the likelihood of dropping out. It is based on interviews with 36 students aged 11-16 from both slum and middle-class backgrounds, in 2012. Most of the participants were in private schools, and learning was overwhelmingly geared towards assessment and the memorisation of set content. Though teachers were sometimes hard-working in preparing their students for examinations, ultimate responsibility fell to the students. Ranking and labelling of students kept their examination performance salient at all times. Teacher-student relationships varied from the supportive to the abusive. Beating and humiliating punishment were common in all types of school, despite a recent legal ban on the former. Lessons were sometimes dry, irrelevant to students’ lives, and with little scope for active student engagement. A new emphasis on ‘creative learning’ in curricula and teacher training had, at the time of the study, yet to filter into the classroom. Students were subject to the risk of violence both outside and inside the school, whatever their background. However, it was much easier for middle class students to change school when they ran into problems, or to employ private tutors if they needed more help with their lessons. Their way of talking about school reflected a strong sense of inevitability that they would at least complete secondary education, whereas students from slums were limited to one or two local options and even there, their places in the classroom were precarious. The paper discusses how these experiences in school are likely to heighten the risk of dropping out for slum students, analyses the results in terms of de-facto privatization and school accountability, and recommends better regulation of private tuition, and teaching styles that are less obsessed with examination results.

The impacts of the recent food, fuel and financial (3F) crises on children’s rights and well-being are being widely documented. However, from a child rights and well-being perspective little regard has so far been given to a particular socio-economic trend that has been indirectly intensified by this three-fold crisis: the proliferation of what are collectively known as ‘commercial pressures on land’ (CPLs). CPLs essentially refer to large-scale investments in land taking part in large parts of the ‘Global South’, led by multiple structural drivers, and undertaken by a variety of public, private and hybrid actors, both domestic and foreign, operating in diverse sectors. This paper aims to provide a comprehensive review of the existing literature on the political economy of CPLs with the specific intention of mapping the relevant channels of impact on the rights and well-being of children living in rural areas where CPLs are fast-proliferating. Although there are some documented benefits, according to the large majority of the literature reviewed, the twin outcomes of displacement and dispossession are found to be critical negative socio-economic changes resulting from CPLs. In conjunction with a pervasive lack of transparency in the land transfer negotiation and implementation processes, the twin outcomes are in turn associated with a number of transmission channels that can impact the rights and well-being of children in affected rural communities, which mainly consist of: loss of access to land and other essential natural resources such as water; increased risk of insecurity of tenure; loss of livelihoods and sources of income; forced evictions; increased exposure to social conflicts and intra-household tensions; and lack of voice. The review also highlights the importance of bridging and rationalising current data on the scale and impact of CPLs on affected communities, which at the moment tends to be polarised between aggregate level data and those collected at localized levels primarily through small-scale case studies. In the absence of extensive child-centred analyses of the impacts of current manifestations of CPLs, the paper calls for further empirical studies which identify and assess, through a child rights and well-being perspective, the particular ‘structure-agency’ conditions under which reported benefits and negative impacts of CPLs take place, in order to address policy response gaps.

Social protection is particularly important for children, in view of their higher levels of vulnerability compared to adults, and the role that social protection can play in ensuring adequate nutrition, access to and utilization of social services. While existing evidence shows that social protection programmes successfully address several dimensions of child well-being – often in an indirect way – a move towards a more “child sensitive” approach to social protection has recently been advocated at the highest level in the international development community. Until now, however, the efforts that have been made to analyse the evidence regarding how social protection affects children have been based on wider analyses of the overall impact of social protection on different groups of recipients, or on analyses based on specific outcomes. This paper explores this issue in more detail. Based on an extensive analysis of the existing evidence on the impact of social protection programmes in the developing world, the paper aims to assess what are the channels that have to be taken into account to understand how the benefits of social protection could be maximized with specific regard to the different dimensions of children’s well-being.

Together with the Innocenti Working paper on relative income poverty of children in rich countries (Bradshaw et al, 2012), this paper on multidimensional child poverty and child deprivation forms the background studies on which the Innocenti Report Card 10 is based (Measuring Child Poverty: New league tables of child poverty in the world‟s rich countries). The paper focuses on child deprivation in Europe and studies the degree to which it is experienced by children in 29 countries using a child specific deprivation scale. The paper discusses the construction of a child deprivation scale and estimates a European Child Deprivation Index for the 29 countries using 14 specific child related variables made available by the child module of the EU-SILC 2009 survey. The 29 countries are ranked according to the degree of child deprivation: the results show considerable differences between the countries. The (non-)overlap between child deprivation and child monetary poverty is considerable but limited. In general the results indicate where policy interventions can produce improvements.

This paper presents and discusses child relative income poverty statistics for 35 economically advanced countries, representing all the members of the European Union, Australia, Canada, Iceland, Japan, New Zealand, Switzerland and the United States. As most of the data refer to the year 2008, the results partly reflect the initial impact of the global economic crisis as well as government responses. According to the data, Nordic countries and the Netherlands present the lowest child relative poverty levels, while Japan, the United States, most of the Southern European countries and some of the new EU member states have among the highest. Several factors are associated with the risk of poverty, such as demographic composition, educational level of household members, labour conditions, but the extent to which these factors influence the risk of poverty vary considerably across countries. Lastly, in several countries the role of government is found to be highly important in reducing child poverty.

Since the end of 2007, countries in Central Asia have been struck by two major consecutive shocks: the food and fuel price increase in 2007-08, and the global economic and financial crisis that began at the end of 2008. Households, both poor and not poor, are directly and adversely affected by the crisis. The multi-dimensionality of the crises and the volatile economic environment challenge the ability of vulnerable households to cope and to maintain their living standards. Social protection programmes play an important role in the response to a crisis. This paper provides an overview of the social and economic vulnerabilities of households with children in the five Central Asian countries, and assesses the ability of national social protection systems to address these, with the main focus on the role of non-contributory cash transfers financed from general government revenues. The paper concludes that the existing social cash transfer systems are not effective in addressing the needs of poor and vulnerable children and families in Central Asia. Limited coverage together with limited funding reduces the potential poverty reduction impact of the programmes. The paper discusses potential strategies for improving existing systems by consolidating and protecting government spending, streamlining existing benefits and transfers, improving the identification of beneficiaries and strengthening administration, monitoring and evaluation systems.

The European Union is developing child specific indicators of well-being to complement the Laeken indicators on poverty and social exclusion. Though many child sensitive indicators have been proposed, none of the measures is sensitive to (changes in) cumulative deprivation, i.e. the degree to which a child simultaneously experiences a range of unfavourable conditions. This paper describes and empirically tests a number of candidate measures of cumulative deprivation to monitor child well-being. The ideal measure is sensitive to (changes in) cumulative deprivation and, given its broad use in the policy community, has an intuitive interpretation. Using the 2007 wave of the EU-SILC data, we construct several headcount and adjusted-headcount measures of cumulative deprivation from a set of 13 deprivation indicators for Germany, France, The Netherlands and the United Kingdom. We test the impact of changes in the main methodological decisions: the exclusion of deprivation indicators, changes in the indicator threshold, changes in the cumulative deprivation threshold and changes in the weighting indicators. Our findings indicate that some measures are considerably more sensitive than others. In the context of the search for child-specific indicators, we conclude that headcount and adjusted headcount measures of cumulative deprivation give relevant and complementary insights into child well-being and perform well in sensitivity tests. While the interpretation of headcount measures is somewhat easier, the adjusted-headcount is additionally able to monitor changes in cumulative deprivation and it is less sensitive to changes in the methodology. Within these two broad classes some non-trivial choices must be made and the adjusted-headcount with a cumulative deprivation threshold of one satisfies the evaluation criteria best. The relative measures of cumulative deprivation are problematic: not only are they very sensitive to changes in methodological decisions, but they are also more difficult to interpret. However, to monitor cumulative deprivation of children there is also a need for child specific indicators (rather than household level indicators) over a wider range of well-being domains.

The paper analyzes the causes of the decline of the under-5 mortality rate (U5MR) in sub-Saharan Africa over the years 1995-2007 by estimating an aggregate econometric model for a panel of 40 countries. This model is then used to compute the impact of the 2008-09 global economic crisis on child mortality, by comparing the number of child deaths which would have occurred under a „no-crisis counterfactual scenario‟ with those computed under the actual „crisis scenario‟. The results suggest that in sub-Saharan Africa the economic slowdown – and in some countries the negative economic growth – generated by the global crisis caused an additional 27000 child deaths. However, if changes occurring during 2008-09 in other determinants of U5MR are factored in, the number of child deaths declined by 15000 units in relation to the counterfactual scenario. A protective effect on U5MR was played by the surge in food production and the increase of public expenditure and foreign aid to health. The countries most negatively affected by the impact of the crisis were the Sudano-Sahelian and Eastern African ones, while Coastal West Africa and Southern Africa generally experienced a steady decline in child deaths. Starting from the U5MR estimates for 2009, the model is also used to assess what values the determinants of U5MR should take over 2009-2015 in order for the countries of the region to meet the MDG4 target as closely as possible. Finally the paper analyzes the determinants of U5MR inequality by wealth quintiles by making use of both aggregate and DHS data on access to services, family characteristics, income per capita, and other variables.

This paper examines the role of civil society in the process of implementing the general measures of the Convention of the Rights of the Child, as defined in article 4 of the Convention and its General Comment No.5 (2003). While it is established in international law that States parties are the primary duty bearers to promote and protect children‟s rights, the Committee on the Rights of the Child has also recognized that other actors, including children, have a right and need to be engaged in this process. An examination of the variety of definitions provided of „civil society‟ reveals that it includes, inter alia, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), community groups, women's groups, environmental movements, faith-based organizations, professional associations, trade unions, self-help groups, social movements, business associations and advocacy groups. Drawing on the author‟s experience in civil society organisations and her membership on the Committee on the Rights of the Child (2003-2009), the findings show that civil society plays an important role in the implementation of the CRC, and that NGOs, in particular, play a vital role. NGOs operate in different legal, economic, social and political settings, which results in varied modalities of work and impacts. The paper draws attention to the wide issues and challenges affecting civil society today, including financial crises, poverty, globalization, and varying levels of political commitment. Based on the examples provided, many of which draw on the concluding observations of the Committee on the Rights of the Child and case studies of civil society activities, the paper lists recommendations for follow-up by key actors. In so doing, this paper seeks to provide concrete recommendations to government, the Committee, and actors at national, regional and international level.

This working paper provides an overview of the transitional process in Colombia and Peru, focusing on the situation of children. The adoption of judicial and administrative measures to deal with human rights violations from the past (Peru) and the present (Colombia) is a tool towards the consolidation of democratic institutions. While individual initiatives have been undertaken in both countries, addressing the situation of children in an integrated, comprehensive way is a persistent challenge, as is the exploration of legal tools as a means to demand responsibility.

This paper reviews and analyses psychosocial support as an essential tool for protection of the rights of children participating in transitional justice mechanisms. Strategies for offering psychosocial support to children involved in transitional justice mechanisms can cover a wide range of interventions. Experiences show that the availability of psychosocial support in combination with effective protection strategies allow children to participate safely, improve the quality of their testimony and protect them against potential harm caused by their participation. The paper first looks at psychosocial factors that affect children‟s participation in transitional justice mechanisms. These factors largely determine children‟s need for protection and support and can reflect children‟s responses to their involvement in transitional justice processes. A distinction has to be made between psychosocial factors related to the child and his or her experiences during the conflict on the one side, and factors determined by the type of transitional mechanism on the other. Children‟s participation in transitional justice processes is influenced significantly by their personal experiences during the conflict; cognitive, social and emotional development; coping skills and social support. These factors influence children‟s capacity to give an accurate statement, cope with the stress of testifying, be confronted with the accused and deal with cross-examination. These have important implications for the choice of support strategies. While all children are affected by armed conflict, some are particularly vulnerable, including children who were direct victims of violence, children associated with armed forces or groups, victims of sexual violence or those who have very limited support in the current situation. The nature of the transitional justice mechanism determines children‟s role in the process, in terms of whether they give a statement, testify in court, participate in a hearing, make a submission or are cross-examined. These characteristics also influence the consequences of children‟s involvement, including possible threats to which they will be exposed. In judicial mechanisms such as international or hybrid tribunals, witnesses are mainly considered providers of evidence, and their involvement is very much shaped by strict rules of procedure and evidence. The adversarial system, common in many of these mechanisms, also puts a heavy burden on witnesses, particularly children. At the same time, international or hybrid tribunals usually have significantly more resources to set up support mechanisms and to establish protective measures for witnesses. Non-judicial mechanisms, in particular truth commissions, can tailor their procedures more easily to meet the needs and capacities of children. Children‟s participation can also take different forms and include innovative forms such as special hearings or submissions by children‟s groups. In addition, the absence of punitive elements and an adversarial process reduces the burden on witnesses and the potential threat against them. However, these mechanisms often lack the resources and mandate to ensure support and protection for children who participate. Second, this paper summarizes the legal framework guiding psychosocial support and protection of children in justice, truth and reconciliation processes. The Convention on the Rights of the Child forms the backbone of the legal framework for the protection and support of children in transitional justice mechanisms. Other instruments relevant for child victims and witnesses include the 1985 Declaration of Basic Principles of Justice for Victims of Crime and Abuse of Power, which outlines benchmarks for the protection of victims of crime, and the UN Guidelines on Justice in Matters involving Child Victims and Witnesses. Further, this paper analyses the strengths and weaknesses of past and current policies and procedures regulating the psychosocial support of children. Throughout the short history of transitional justice mechanisms psychosocial support for witnesses has developed in response to the growing involvement of child victims. The Special Court for Sierra Leone, the International Criminal Court and the truth commissions in Sierra Leone and in Liberia have put in place a variety of measures to protect the rights of child victims and witnesses participating in procedures. The following measures are discussed in the article: Integration of provisions for protection and support into the regulatory framework of transitional justice mechanisms; Selection of specialized staff and adequate training of all staff on issues related to dealing with child witnesses; Vulnerability assessment of potential child witnesses; Individual support and counselling before, during and after testimony; Establishment of protective measures before, during and after testimony; Long-term support and referral; Involvement of the community in support strategies and the use of local approaches to healing. Based on these experiences, a number of challenges are presented related to the involvement of children in transitional justice mechanisms, including the need to balance the right to participation and the right to protection. The paper looks as well at the discrepancy between the resources made available for different justice mechanisms and the possibilities for child participation that they can offer. Also discussed is the necessity to manage expectations of victims and witnesses involved in transitional justice mechanisms. The paper concludes with a number of recommendations for enhancing the protection of children in transitional justice mechanisms.

The last several decades have witnessed a dramatic change in the methods of warfare. Civilians are now increasingly targets of violence, not just mere victims of collateral damage. Among civilians targeted, children and youth are subject to acts of violence, including enforced disappearances and enforced conscription. Children have been forcibly disappeared and forcibly conscripted in many countries including Argentina, El Salvador and northern Uganda. This paper focuses on the use or potential use of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) or genetic testing to identify disappeared children (otherwise referred to as genetic tracing) in Argentina, El Salvador and northern Uganda and on how this evidence may be used to achieve justice. Identification of the disappeared, family reunification, support for the disappeared and redress for families of the disappeared have been identified as crucial to achieving justice in the wake of mass atrocities.1 Genetic tracing has proved to be an exceptionally powerful tool to identify disappeared children, facilitate family reunification and seek accountability in countries such as Argentina and El Salvador. It could likewise play a crucial role in regions such as northern Uganda that are on the verge of emerging from armed conflict and will face similar post-conflict challenges.

This paper examines truth and reconciliation commissions that have made reference to a longer-term role for education in coming to terms with the past and contributing towards future reconciliation. The countries reviewed are Guatemala, Liberia, Peru, Sierra Leone, South Africa and Timor-Leste. Some have developed strategies for children‟s participation and made recommendations for inclusion in the formal school curriculum. However, recommendations regarding a role for education have usually been very general in nature, with little specification of what is expected of educators in practical terms and little follow-through by education authorities. The paper therefore identifies a number of challenges if education is to have a role in truth and reconciliation. It also identifies potential areas for educational development and recommendations for future actions.

This paper is among the first to analyse children‟s experiences of reparations programmes, taking into consideration programmes from Africa, Asia and Latin America. The violence, abuse and hardship that girls and boys suffer during armed conflict and political violence under authoritarian and dictatorial regimes continues to severely affect their development long after the end of war or demise of the violent regime. They experience violations of their civil, political, social, economic and cultural rights, including the rights to life, freedom of movement and association, education, health and family, which embraces the right to knowing and being cared for by their parents. Their rights to development and to a safe and healthy environment are also violated. It is not possible to fully repair children who have experienced such harms. Nonetheless, girls and boys have a right to remedy and reparation under international law – to benefit from reparation in material, symbolic, individual and collective forms. This working paper draws from reparation as conceived in the United Nations Resolution on Basic Principles and Guidelines on the Right to a Remedy and Reparation for Victims of Gross Violations of International Human Rights Law and Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law (2005). It offers a concise overview of trends in reparation programmes set up to address situations of armed conflict and under authoritarian and dictatorial regimes where children are subjected to systematic forms of grave violence. The authors demonstrate the failure to name and address grave rights violations against children in www.unicef-irc.org. past reparations programmes and efforts, much to the detriment of surviving children. The authors argue that at the heart of much of the violence against children in situations of armed conflict is the terrible damage done to relationships and social fabric among individuals, communities, societies and cultures. Recognizing the need to address the healing of relationships and reweaving of social fabric, in part through reparation, the paper offers suggestions for reparation approaches that could lead to better informing and shaping reparation responses for child victims.

Like many countries in sub-Saharan Africa, Ghana is experiencing the impact of the global crisis and the uncertain economic outlook. Indeed, as Ghana’s economy is among the most open in Africa, it is expected that the country has been and will continue to be severely affected by the crisis, although strong export prices of its main exports (gold and cocoa) may at least partially counteract the effects associated with the crisis. The main goal of this paper is to understand the potential impacts of the 2008/9 global crisis on different dimensions of child poverty (monetary, hunger, school participation, child labour and access to health services) in Ghana and to support the policy-maker in designing the most appropriate policy response to counteract the negative effects of the crisis. As timely data are not available, a combined macro-micro economic model to predict the impact of the global crisis on children was developed. Simulations suggest that the financial crisis would increase monetary poverty and hunger across all regions of Ghana, eroding many of the gains made over the past few years. Indeed, in comparison with the year preceding the crisis, instead of a reduction of four percentage points in child monetary poverty in 2011 predicted in the absence of crisis, the simulations indicate a 6.6 percentage point increase, with a continuous increasing pattern over the period of study. The global crisis is also predicted to severely deepen hunger among children, which is simulated to increase up to 6.6 percentage points in 2011 beginning with a sharp increase already in 2009. For both monetary poverty and hunger, the impact of the crisis differs across all regions, with the Eastern, Volta and Greater Accra regions predicted to be the most affected. Children’s participation in schooling and labour, as well as their access to health services, are forecast to be much less affected by the crisis, although it is found to reverse predicted increases in enrolment and health access (with substitution toward more modern types of health services) and forecasted reductions in child labour. Finally, alternative policy options have been simulated: a cash transfer programme targeted to poor children is found to be generally more effective in protecting children than food subsidies. Indeed, with a total budget equivalent to 1% of 2008 GDP, a cash transfer – equivalent to an individual annual amount of 19.8 Cedis – would cut the predicted increase in monetary poverty by over two percentage points in 2011. Although Ghana might be in a position to rapidly implement a cash transfer programme building on the existing Livelihood Empowerment against Poverty (LEAP) programme, other interventions (or mix of policies) might be more cost-effective in the short run. A combination of a universal or regionally targeted cash transfer programmes for children aged 0 to 5 years old, together with a school-feeding programme in poorer regions, might represent an effective way to intervene quickly to improve child well-being.

Burkina Faso‟s hard earned economic gains in recent years have been eroded by the 2008-09 world financial and economic crisis. The country will particularly feel the effects of the world economic crisis due to its close links with the world economy. Most of the adverse effects are transmitted to households then passed onto children. The situation of children principally depends on the monetary and non-monetary wellbeing of their household. This, together with their greater vulnerability, means that children are at risk of suffering more, and for longer, from the impacts of the crisis. It is therefore crucial to understand and anticipate the effects that the crisis may have on children in Burkina Faso and to propose options for social protection to counter these effects. To this end, we propose a macro-micro economic approach. Macro-micro economic analysis uses a general calculable equilibrium (CGE) model to simulate the impacts of various transmission channels of the crisis to the Burkinabe economy. The results of these simulations are then used for the micro-econometric analysis, which integrates individual and household economic behaviour to evaluate the impact of the crisis on child welfare. According to our simulations, which run from 2009 to 2011, the financial crisis respectively leads to 5 and 1 percentage point increases in the incidence of monetary and caloric poverty among Burkinabe children. Moreover, the school enrolment rate for children will decline by about 0.7 percentage points due to the crisis, while the child labour rate will increase by about 1 percentage point. Finally, a 1 percentage point decrease in the medical consultation rate among children is expected, along with substitution from modern health services to traditional medicine. Large regional and rural vs. urban gaps are also noted. A monetary transfer policy targeting poor children appears to be the most effective at reversing the negative effects of the crisis and returning to the trend that would have existed without the crisis. Such a policy, financed by external aid and with a budget of 1% of GDP, re-establishes the trend that monetary poverty would have followed in the absence of a crisis and even leads to a reduction in hunger. It also limits the crisis‟ adverse effects on school enrolment, child labour and sick children‟s access to modern health care services. A universal (non-targeted) variant of this transfer policy for 0-5 year-olds has similar results and is easier to enact. Policies which subsidize food and cereals, as well as monetary transfer policies for the Centre and Mouhoun regions (the areas most affected by the August-September 2009 floods) were also analyzed.

The current global financial and economic crisis, which exacerbates the impacts of the energy and food crises that immediately preceded it, has spread to the developing countries endangering recent gains in terms of economic growth and poverty reduction. The effects of the crisis are likely to vary substantially between countries and between individuals within the same country. Children are among the most vulnerable population, particularly in a period of crisis. Especially in least developed countries, where social safety nets programmes are missing or performing poorly and public fiscal space is extremely limited, households with few economic opportunities are at a higher risk of falling into (monetary) poverty, suffering from hunger, removing children from school and into work, and losing access to health services. This study simulates the impacts of the global economic crisis and alternative policy responses on different dimensions of child welfare in Western and Central Africa (WCA) over the period 2009-2011. It is based on country studies for Burkina Faso, Cameroon, and Ghana, which broadly represent the diversity of economic conditions in WCA countries. In order to capture the complex macro-economic effects of the crisis and the various policy responses – on trade, investment, remittances, aid flows, goods and factor markets – and to then trace their consequences in terms of child welfare – monetary poverty, hunger (caloric poverty), school participation, child labour, and access to health services – a combination of macro- and micro-analysis was adopted. The simulations suggest that the strongest effects are registered in terms of monetary poverty and hunger, although large differences between countries emerge. More moderate impacts are predicted in terms of school participation, child labour, and access to health care, although these are still significant and require urgent policy responses. Specifically, Ghana is the country where children are predicted to suffer the most in terms of monetary poverty and hunger, while Burkina Faso is where the largest deteriorations in schooling, child labour and access to health services are simulated. Among the policy responses examined to counteract the negative effects of the crisis on child wellbeing, a targeted cash transfer to predicted poor children is by far the most effective programme. A comparison between a universal and targeted approach is also presented.

This paper provides an overview of research findings, legislation, policy and programme responses to prevent and respond to the sexual abuse and exploitation of boys in South Asia. The background to the paper is based on the findings from previously conducted UNICEF IRC research on child trafficking in the region, in which it was indicated that boys enjoy less legal protection than girls from sexual abuse and exploitation and less access to service for victims. While it is seen that the majority of legislation and policies that address ‘children’ adequately address ‘boys’, this paper notes areas in which the rights and needs of boys require greater focus. Among the concerns is the absence of legal commentary on legislation regarding boys’ issues and an absence of advocacy efforts to take action and amend laws to provide equal protection to boys. In some cases legislation covers only girls and women. And, although research shows that boys face nearly the same degree of sexual abuse and exploitation as girls, programming throughout the region is overwhelmingly directed at girls and women. Evidence-based information is lacking on the sexual abuse of both boys and girls and on the sexual exploitation of boys. The majority of studies to date have emphasized trafficking for sexual exploitation and have been focused on women and girls. Research on trafficking has concentrated on recruitment, transportation and sale of victims; little research has been conducted on the subsequent situations of exploitation into which children are trafficked. Some countries in South Asia are beginning to fill the knowledge gap regarding both child sexual abuse and sexual exploitation of boys. The information that is presented was mainly gathered in 2008, but it remains limited by the sources available, some of which date back several years previously. The findings are however considered to be relatively robust and consistent. The report presents concrete recommendations for strengthening legislation, policy and programmes to address this issue from a child rights based approach. It highlights that listening to boys and girls and learning from their experiences and recommendations are key to designing and implementing effective preventive and protective mechanisms.

Since 2006, Mali has experienced the full effects of the global food crisis, with price increases of up to 67%. This study presents simulations of the impacts of this crisis and a number of policy responses with respect to the welfare of children. The impacts are analyzed in terms of monetary (food) poverty, nutrition, education, child labor and access to health services of children. According to simulations, food poverty among children would have increased from 41% to 51%, with a corresponding rise in caloric insufficiency from 32% to 40%, while the impacts on school participation, work and access to health services would have been relatively weak. To prepare an adequate response, the government should start by identifying the poor individuals who are to be protected, based on a limited number of easily observed sociodemographic characteristics. A method of targeting these individuals is proposed in this study. However, simulations show that with targeting about one quarter of poor children would be erroneously excluded (under-coverage), while more than a third of non-poor children would be erroneously included (leakage). These identification errors, which increase in proportion with the extremity of poverty, reduce the impact and increase the cost of any public interventions. That having been said, it is important to note that leakage to the non-poor can nonetheless improve the conditions of children in terms of caloric intake, school participation, child labour and access to health services, none of which are exclusive to poor children. When targeting children or sub-groups of children by age, benefits will likely be deflected to some extent to other family members. Moreover, it is total household income, regardless of the member targeted, that determines decisions relating to child work, education or access to health services. School feeding programmes are found to be a particularly efficient policy in that they concentrate public funds exclusively on the consumption of highly nutritious foods, while cash transfers can be used by households for other purposes. Moreover, school feeding programmes are likely to have desirable effects on school participation and child labour. However, there are some caveats due to the fact that these programmes exclude children who do not attend school, the difficulty of exclusively targeting poor children and the possibility that child food rations at home will be proportionally reduced.