


(28 January 2021) More than 39 billion in-school meals have been missed globally since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic due to school closures, according to a new report released today by the UNICEF Office of Research - Innocenti and the World Food Programme (WFP). COVID-19: Missing More Than a Classroom notes that 370 million children worldwide – many of whom are reliant on school meals as a key source of their daily nutrition – have missed 40 per cent of in-school meals, on average, since COVID-19 restrictions shuttered classrooms.


(15 December 2020) Evidence and objective assessment are needed more than ever to help enhance the rights and well-being of the world’s children. Researching the changing world around us and evaluating progress are critical to reimagining a better future for children everywhere. In recognition of this, the Best of UNICEF Research and Evaluation 2020 celebrates and showcases innovative and influential research and evaluations from UNICEF offices around the world.
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Multidimensional Child Poverty in Montenegro
(24 February 2021) Efforts to measure poverty among children have traditionally relied on calculations of household income. But it has become clear that such a one-dimensional approach is inadequate for understanding the depth, breadth and consequences of child poverty. This report takes a different, far more nuanced, approach. As a study of multidimensional poverty, it explores the various ways in which poverty is manifested among Montenegro’s children – affecting their health, education, safety and future human development.


Multidimensional Child Poverty in Montenegro
(24 February 2021) Efforts to measure poverty among children have traditionally relied on calculations of household income. But it has become clear that such a one-dimensional approach is inadequate for understanding the depth, breadth and consequences of child poverty. This report takes a different, far more nuanced, approach. As a study of multidimensional poverty, it explores the various ways in which poverty is manifested among Montenegro’s children – affecting their health, education, safety and future human development.


1 in 3 Italian families unable to support children’s remote learning during the lockdown
Florence/Milan, 8 February 2021 – Approximately 27 per cent of families reported not having suitable technology during the lockdown in Italy, and 30 per cent of parents said they didn't have time to support their children with remote learning, according to a new study based on interviews with 1,028 families across Italy. Six per cent of the children in the same sample were unable to take part in distance learning activities provided by their schools due to unstable connectivity or lack of devices.


Call for Papers on Singularity and Diversity in Child, Early and Forced Marriage
(3 February 2021) UNICEF Innocenti’s Child Rights and Protection team is collaborating with guest editors from across the globe to develop a Supplement of the Journal of Adolescent Health focusing on child, early and forced marriage. We invite you to submit papers according to the details below.


School-Related Violence in Latin America and the Caribbean
(14 January 2021) The prevalence of school-related violence and, in particular, bullying is not a new or isolated phenomenon, nor is it limited to certain schools or countries. Abundant evidence indicates that bullying is widespread and has a negative impact on educational outcomes. Children who are victims of bullying can also be affected emotionally and physically in both the short and long terms. Evidence from low- and middle-income countries on bullying is less extensive when compared to the evidence available on predictors and effects of bullying from high-income countries. However, some findings for the Latin American and Caribbean region seem to suggest a similar picture, with a high prevalence of bullying victimization and association to lower reading scores in different subjects tested.


Children and COVID-19 Research Library cuts through the noise
(15 November 2020) The UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti has produced the Children and COVID-19 Research Library to highlight the available global scientific research and evidence on children and the coronavirus pandemic. The Children and COVID-19 Library is a searchable database of research from the most reputable sources around the world on the coronavirus pandemic and its impacts on children and adolescents. It is one of the most advanced publicly accessible databases of research on COVID-19 and children available.


COVID-19 & Children: Rapid Research Response
UNICEF Innocenti is mobilizing a rapid research response in line with UNICEF’s global response to the COVID-19 crisis. The initiatives we’ve begun will provide the broad range of evidence needed to inform our work to scale up rapid assessment, develop urgent mitigating strategies in programming and advocacy, and preparation of interventions to respond to the medium and longer-term consequences of the COVID-19 crisis. The research projects cover a rapid review of evidence, education analysis, and social and economic policies.
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Innocenti Report Card 16 looks at 'Worlds of Influence' that shape child well-being
(3 September 2020) Visit our Innocenti Report Card 16 microsite where we dive deep into the activities, relationships, networks, resources, policies and context that combine to shape child well-being with a focus on 41 'rich' countries of the OECD and the EU. The result is one of the most comprehensives studies on child well-being ever produced and a ranking of the world's rich countries on key outcomes for children in mental well-being, physical health and skills.


Social protection after COVID-19 in Eastern Europe and Central Asia
Discussions around the effects of the COVID-19 crisis and its impacts and costs are moving swiftly from health concerns to economic and social concerns. The ways in which countries are dealing with COVID-19 itself, through social lockdowns and school closures, are expected to have wide-ranging social and economic costs and governments have responded with rapid implementation of fiscal stimulus and social protection reforms. COVID-19 is a global health crisis, with severe economic consequences, impacting countries and continents in waves, and therefore is – with the exception of the Spanish Flu in 1918 – without a recent comparator. Necessarily this means that experience with, and evidence for, dealing with such a crisis is limited.


COVID-19 may pose greater risk to children than originally thought
(21 July 2020) It is commonly accepted, at least for now, that children and young people under 20 years of age have largely been spared the direct epidemiological effects on their own health and survival of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), responsible for COVID-19 disease. This narrative is based predominantly on early data from the countries first affected by the virus, notably China (Wuhan province) and Italy in early 2020, and also from other high-income countries (HICs) including the United States and some European nations. This narrative has conditioned the subsequent screening and testing for SARS-CoV-2 virus in children and young people under 20, which have been notably lower than for other age cohorts in many, but not all, countries.


Impacts of Pandemics and Epidemics on Child Protection
(21 July 2020) There are various pathways through which infectious disease outbreaks can exacerbate vulnerabilities, generate new risks and result in negative outcomes for children. This rapid review collates and synthesizes evidence on the child protection impacts of COVID-19 and previous pandemics, epidemics and infectious disease outbreaks. It provides lessons for global and national responses to COVID19 and recommendations for future research priorities.