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Children and COVID-19 Research Library

UNICEF Innocenti's curated library of COVID-19 + Children research

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Accelerating SDG 11 achievements during Covid-19 drisis: protecting children living in slums' rights

AUTHOR(S)
Nurul Hidayat Ab Rahman

Published: November 2022   Journal: Malaysian Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities
Rapid urbanization in metropolitan areas resulted in a mounting number of slum dwellers such as street children, insufficient basic infrastructures, and services. Hence, the world pledges 'sustainable cities and communities' under the Sustainable Development Goals 2030, which aims to make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable for everyone. The objective becomes explicitly vital due to the spread of COVID-19, as over 90 per cent cases are befallen in urban areas. Slum neighborhoods areas are constituted as the most at-risk urban locations which recorded the highest numbers of infectious cases. Hence, this article summarizes SDG 11, focusing on Target 11.1 and Target 11.5 to guarantee access to adequate, safe, affordable housing and essential services for all humans and upgrading slums. Both targets aim to significantly reduce the number of deaths and people affected by direct economic loss due to disasters. The primary purposes of this paper are to explain the challenges faced by the children living in slums in exercising their human rights, particularly during the pandemic epoch and legal analysis on the Convention on the Rights of Child (CRC).
National agrifood systems and COVID-19 in Iraq: effects, policy responses and long-term implications

This report is part of a series of country profiles that describe: (i) policy measures enacted by the government of Iraq to contain the spread of the virus; (ii) policies and measures to stabilize the functioning of agri-food systems; (iii) potential effects of policies on agri-food systems and vulnerable groups. Finally, the profiles also assess longer-term options for agri-food system policies and investments to make them more resilient.


Leveraging COVID-19 recovery strategies to build climate-smart agrifood systems in developing countries

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has jeopardized the stability of agrifood systems and the welfare of the rural households that are actively engaged in the different components of these systems, particularly in developing countries. Efforts are underway to redress the negative impacts of the pandemic through investments to ‘build back better’. These efforts represent an enormous opportunity to make significant and lasting contribution to the longer-term resilience and sustainability of agrifood systems in the context of climate change.The objective of this report is to provide an overview of the current opportunities for harnessing short-term response and recovery efforts to address longer-term impacts on resilience and sustainability. The analysis focuses on the role of climate-smart agriculture (CSA) in recovery strategies and outlines concrete policy objectives that can be implemented by national governments and their development partners. The report is structured in two parts. The first part outlines the nature of the challenges presented by climate change and COVID-19, their interrelationships, and the potential role CSA can play in addressing these interrelated challenges. The second part of the report outlines a set of policy options for enabling post-pandemic recovery efforts to contribute to longer-term resilience of agrifood systems through investments in CSA and associated enabling conditions.

Green vs. screen: exploring the outcomes of an in-person and virtual nature-based environmental education intervention for low-income children

AUTHOR(S)
Nadav L. Sprague; Ashby L. Sachs; Christine C. Ekenga

Published: October 2022   Journal: Sustainability
The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 forced a rapid transition to virtual learning. During the pandemic, many nature-based environmental education (NBEE) interventions shifted to virtual formats. In this study, we compare the impacts of a virtual NBEE intervention with its in-person NBEE counterpart. Between January and May 2021, a total of 49 low-income children (ages 9 to 13) from St. Louis, MO USA participated in this study. There were 37 children that participated in the virtual NBEE intervention and 12 students in the in-person NBEE intervention. Study participants completed a pre-/post-test survey that included items related to exposure to nature, perceived neighborhood safety, and self-reported quality of life. Children who participated in the in-person intervention reported higher post-intervention levels of nature exposure, perceived neighborhood safety, self-confidence, and self-efficacy than children who participated in the virtual intervention.
Children rights to 'Zero hunger' and the execution challenges during the COVID-19 crisis

AUTHOR(S)
Nurul Hidayat binti Ab Rahman; Redwan bin Yasin

Published: August 2022   Journal: Hasanuddin Law Review
‘Zero hunger is the world’s pledge under the Sustainable Development Goals 2030, which aims to end hunger, achieve food security and improve nutrition. Nevertheless, the mission had been seized as the world faced economic turndown due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 virus. The circumstances have brutally affected society’s ideal living standards and raised social problems such as extreme poverty, famishment, malnutrition, and medical conditions, specifically among vulnerable children. The essential purpose of this writing is to elucidate the ‘zero hunger goal as one of the central legal rights and identify challenges in executing it during the COVID-19 crisis. Data were collected through library studies and analyzed critically using the content analysis method.
Inclusive and resilient societies: equality, sustainability and efficiency
Institution: UNESCO, Fundacion La Caixa
Published: May 2022

This first UNESCO Policy Report on Inclusive and Resilient Societies, released as the world enters the third year of the pandemic, analyses the causes, nature and evolution of inequalities during the COVID-19 crisis. High-level analysis and findings are detailed in this summary, with detail provided in the report.

Prospects for children in 2022: a global outlook
Institution: *UNICEF
Published: January 2022
In 2021, the Office of Global Insight and Policy (OGIP) produced a medium-term analysis of global trends in support of UNICEF’s preparation of a new Strategic Plan. The report ‘Prospects for children: a global outlook through 2025’ examined the nature and consequences of a potential exit from the COVID-19 pandemic and explored the trajectory of longer-term trends identified as being critical in shaping the world and children’s lives over the next five years. These were: (i) weakened support for multilateralism; (ii) slowing globalization; (iii) global warming; (iv) evolving rules and norms governing the online world; and (v) the decline of democratization and civic space. As a follow-up to this exercise, the Global Insight team intends to produce an outlook assessment with a 12-month time horizon at the start of each year. Our aim is twofold: to draw the attention of the global community to the effects of global trends and events on child rights and well-being; and to support UNICEF staff and offices in interpreting and engaging in a rapidly changing world.
Investment case for child-centred climate actions in the context of COVID-19 in East Asia and the Pacific
Institution: *UNICEF, Vivid Economics
Published: November 2021

The dual challenges of the climate crisis and COVID-19 pandemic compound on each other and are disproportionately impacting children in East Asia and Pacific. This calls for ambitious climate actions that help advance climate justice for current and future generations of children and support a green and inclusive recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. As stated by the UN Secretary-General António Guterres, the pandemic recovery is “a profound opportunity” to steer the world on “a path that tackles climate change, protects the environment, reverses biodiversity loss and ensures the long-term health and security of humankind”. Unless inclusive climate-smart solutions are prioritized in the recovery phase, there is a high risk of emissions rebounding and governments locking themselves in to a carbon-intense future, leaping from the COVID-19 frying pan into the climate fire. This working paper provides an economic analysis of climate and COVID-19 recovery policy measures in East Asia and the Pacific region and makes an investment case for accelerating ambitious and inclusive climate actions through national climate policies and COVID-19 recovery measures in East Asia and the Pacific and beyond.

COVID-19 and health sector development plans in Africa: the impact on maternal and child health outcomes in Uganda

AUTHOR(S)
M. G. Atim; V. D. Kajogoo; D. Amare (et al.)

Published: October 2021   Journal: Risk Management and Healthcare Policy
Health Sector Development Plans (HSDPs) aim to accelerate movement towards achieving sustainable development goals for health, reducing inequalities, and ending poverty. Reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health (RMNCH) services are vulnerable to economic imbalances, including health insecurity, unmet need for healthcare, and low health expenditure. The same vulnerability influences the potential of a country to combat global outbreaks such as the COVID-19. This paper aimed to provide some important insights into the impacts of COVID-19 on RMNCH indicators and outcomes of the HSDP in Uganda.
Uneven global education stimulus risks widening learning disparities
Institution: UNESCO
Published: October 2021
Due  to  the  COVID-19  Pandemic,  governments  around  the world  risk  losing  years  of  progress  towards  the  Sustainable Development Goal on education (SDG4) in the 2030 Education Agenda if they do not invest sufficiently in education systems during the crisis response and recovery. Education is not only a human right, but also a strategy for ongoing economic revival and  sustainable  development.  Efforts  to  sustain  or  increase economic investment in education should be smart, strong, and leave no one behind, providing targeted stimulus to vulnerable populations at higher risk of dropping out. UNESCO believes that  the  post-pandemic  economic  recovery  is  dependent  on short- and long-term investment in flexible, resilient education systems that can respond quickly and efficiently.
Measuring and forecasting progress in education: what about early childhood?

AUTHOR(S)
Linda M. Richter; Jere R. Behrman; Pia Britto (et al.)

Published: September 2021   Journal: npj Science of Learning
A recent Nature article modelled within-country inequalities in primary, secondary, and tertiary education and forecast progress towards Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) targets related to education (SDG 4). However, their paper entirely overlooks inequalities in achieving Target 4.2, which aims to achieve universal access to quality early childhood development, care and preschool education by 2030. This is an important omission because of the substantial brain, cognitive and socioemotional developments that occur in early life and because of increasing evidence of early-life learning’s large impacts on subsequent education and lifetime wellbeing. This study provides an overview of this evidence and uses new analyses to illustrate medium- and long-term implications of early learning, first by presenting associations between pre-primary programme participation and adolescent mathematics and science test scores in 73 countries and secondly, by estimating the costs of inaction (not making pre-primary programmes universal) in terms of forgone lifetime earnings in 134 countries. This study finds considerable losses, comparable to or greater than current governmental expenditures on all education (as percentages of GDP), particularly in low- and lower-middle-income countries. In addition to improving primary, secondary and tertiary schooling, it concludes that to attain SDG 4 and reduce inequalities in a post-COVID era, it is essential to prioritize quality early childhood care and education, including adopting policies that support families to promote early learning and their children’s education.
Global, regional, and national progress towards Sustainable development goal 3.2 for neonatal and child health: all-cause and cause-specific mortality findings from the Global burden of disease study 2019
Published: September 2021   Journal: The Lancet
Sustainable Development Goal 3.2 has targeted elimination of preventable child mortality, reduction of neonatal death to less than 12 per 1000 livebirths, and reduction of death of children younger than 5 years to less than 25 per 1000 livebirths, for each country by 2030. To understand current rates, recent trends, and potential trajectories of child mortality for the next decade, we present the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study (GBD) 2019 findings for all-cause mortality and cause-specific mortality in children younger than 5 years of age, with multiple scenarios for child mortality in 2030 that include the consideration of potential effects of COVID-19, and a novel framework for quantifying optimal child survival.
Empowering the workforce of tomorrow

This report released by UNICEF and the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), provides concrete recommendations for actions that businesses can take to help address the “skills mismatch” that young people all over the world are encountering. Based on combined insights from WBCSD’s Future of Work project and UNICEF’s programming and research experience in the area of education, the “Empowering the Workforce of Tomorrow: The role of Business in Tackling the Skills Mismatch among Youth” report highlights the scale of the skills mismatch challenge globally, its root causes and the impacts it has on youth, business and society more broadly. Young people in particular are being disproportionately affected by these disruptions. All over the world, hundreds of millions of individuals are coming of age and finding themselves unemployed and unemployable, lacking the right skills to take up the jobs available today and, even more, the skills that will be needed tomorrow.

Rise, respond, recover: renewing progress on women’s, children’s and adolescents’ health in the era of COVID-19

AUTHOR(S)
Jennifer Requejo

This action brief summarizes the latest status and trends of key areas related to women’s, children’s and adolescents’ health and well-being from a global perspective. It aims to promote coordinated action among global and national partners to recognize and overcome the disproportionate impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on women, children and adolescents and to accelerate progress to meet the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Rise, Respond, Recover is an update to Protect the Progress: 2020 progress report on Every Woman Every Child Global Strategy for Women’s, Childrens’ and Adolescents’ Health (September 2020), capturing key evidence points presented in May 2021 to the World Health Assembly as well as top priorities and activities among partners.

Foundations for building forward better : an education reform path for Lebanon
Institution: The World Bank
Published: June 2021
Human capital development is a critical determinant of economic growth, equity, and prosperity, but outcomes in this domain are worryingly low inLebanon, risking the future of generations of children. Lebanese children lag behind their peers in human capital development—measured accordingto the World Bank (2020c) Human Capital Index—suggesting that the future productivity of the labor force and the country’s trajectory for equitablegrowth is at risk (World Bank 2020b). The Human Capital Index indicates that children born in Lebanon today will reach, on average, only 52 percentof their potential productivity when they grow up. This is lower than the average estimates for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region(57 percent) and upper-middle-income countries (56 percent). Lebanon’s poor performance on the Human Capital Index is largely attributed to theeducation outcomes calculated for the index.
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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.