Social inclusion and child rights monitoring
UNICEF believes that empirical research and data gathering are essential elements to reducing mulit dimensional poverty and building resilience of the most vulnerable boys and girls
Challenges
This programme component, which complements and supports the other components, seeks to strengthen the capacity to monitor children’s rights, reduce multidimensional poverty and provide inclusive and equitable access to social protection services, especially for the most disadvantaged children. It seeks to ensure that national systems and policies effectively address the multiple deprivations that affect the most vulnerable boys and girls across the lifecycle, building their resilience through social investments and rights-based social policies. The programme will provide technical support to facilitate the decentralization of services, when needed, to better serve and protect children and their families throughout the country. These efforts will build on the existing initiatives of key actors. The capacity strengthening of national statistics offices and civil registry offices will remain a priority in order to improve the generation, analysis and use of disaggregated data that help to better target the most vulnerable children and families with inclusive policies. The programme will support the countries in building evidence on multidimensional poverty to improve social programme targeting and public investments.
Solutions
By means of South-South exchange, together with technical support, UNICEF and international partners will support the strengthening of national capacities to develop and deliver inclusive and equitable child-focused social protection systems. This will be augmented by national development planning to strengthen resilience against crises and shocks and protect children from poverty and social exclusion. The programme will identify policy gaps to achieve the reduction of inequalities affecting the most vulnerable families in both interior and coastal areas.
UNICEF will work with both Governments on policy decisions regarding the social investment in children as well as the efficiency, effectiveness, equity and transparency of spending to ensure adequate resource allocations for quality social services in social protection, ECD and child protection, particularly for the most disadvantaged and vulnerable children. Specific assistance will be provided to increase the capacity of Governments and academic institutions to assess and monitor national social investment in children and women and to strengthen evidence-informed programme and policy development to implement the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
UNICEF will support both countries in their monitoring and reporting on the implementation of international commitments relating to child rights through the provision of technical advice and assistance for reporting as well as by making and implementing plans to follow up on recommendations from the Committee on the Rights of the Child, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the universal periodic review and other international human rights mechanisms.