Profiles

(26 August 2021) Showcasing the awe, excitement, uncertainty, and troubles of childhood, the UNICEF Innocenti Film Festival (UIFF) returns to Florence and online this October. 31 films from 26 countries depicting narratives of childhood will be shown, accompanied with dialogues between the film makers and UNICEF experts.

UNICEF turns 75 this year. To celebrate its resolute commitment to children – and as we launch the second UNICEF Innocenti Film Festival showcasing new, high-quality cinema narratives of childhood – we look back to some of the greatest film narratives of childhood. After watching hundreds of amazing films about childhood from every corner of the world, from the 1940s to 2010s, we selected one from each decade that tells a story in consonance with UNICEF’s mission to protect children's rights, help meet their basic needs and expand their opportunities to reach their full potential. From helping displaced or abandoned children to ensuring special protection for the most disadvantaged – victims of war, disasters, extreme poverty, all forms of violence and exploitation, and those with disabilities – UNICEF strives to work for every child, at all stages of childhood, including adolescence.    The Search, USA, 1948Against the backdrop of post-World War II Europe, is the story of a Karel (Ivan Jandl), a young concentration camp survivor in search of a future; Steve (Montgomery Clift), a US Army engineer in search of justice; and Hanna (Jarmila Novotná), a mother desperately in search of her son. While Steve befriends Karel, he devotes himself to working with the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) – re-emerged in 1946 as “temporary” programme then called the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF). Directed by Fred Zinnemann, a pioneer in “location” films – mostly shot among the ruins of war in Germany – The Search is one the early films to show the horrible impacts of the war on children. It might also be the first Hollywood production to depict the work of the United Nations and UNICEF, which still addresses the most challenging humanitarian issues facing children in conflict zones today. The Search won the 1948 Academy Award for Best Story and a Special Juvenile Oscar given to Ivan Jandl was accepted on his behalf by Fred Zinnemann because he was not allowed to travel to the US from his home in the country today known as Czechia.    Pather Panchali, India, 1955A poetic and immersive directorial debut by one of India’s greatest filmmakers, Satyajit Ray, Pather Panchali (Song of the Little Road in Bengali) was a bona fide international film festival sensation. While not widely distributed at the time of its release, it premiered at New York’s Museum of Modern Art in 1955 – just two years after the UN General Assembly approved a new, and for the first time permanent, mission for UNICEF to assist vulnerable children around the world. Heavily influenced by the Italian neorealism movement, Pather Panchali focuses on the lives of poor children and their family, particularly their female caregivers, in a rural Bengal village. India’s first independent film to attract major international attention and sensitize a global audience to the hardships of the country’s rural poor, it has been criticized for romanticizing the lives of the poor, and praised for its realism and humanity.    L’Enfance nue, France, 1968Abandoned by his mother, François is a child of the French foster care system, continually placed in and kicked out of foster families because of his troubled and, at times, cruel behavior. However, at 10 years old, he also has a softer, reflective side. Maurice Pialat’sL’Enfance nue (Naked Childhood), presents an unvarnished look at what happens to children when things go wrong, and parents cannot provide the care they need. Released during the tense May 1968 civil unrest in France, which began with a series of student protests, L’Enfance nue, drew attention for its unsentimental portrayal of children in the foster care system. At the same time, new research and thinking about children in care showed unacceptable outcomes for institutionalized children. Orphanages and childcare institutions – including the Ospedale Degli Innocenti in Florence – had begun to rethink their forms of care for abandoned children and to consider closing such institutions in favor of homelike care settings, a trend which would grow and expand to countries at all levels of economic development in the years to follow.    Tale of Tales, Soviet Union, 1979Judged in 1984 by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to be the best animated short film of all time, Tale of Tales is a good example of the great achievements in animation across the Eastern Bloc prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Director Yuri Norstein’s scenes were said to appear like masterful oil paintings that came alive with perfect realism. This powerful impression was said to have been achieved by a unique system of photographing animated cells on multiple glass planes which were moved relative to the camera. The film’s structure is non-linear, and designed to convey the fragmentary and fuzzy images of human memory. The binding element is the perception of childhood during war-time poverty combined with nostalgic scenes of close human relationships experienced during times of deprivation. In Norstein’s words, the film is “about simple concepts that give you the strength to live.” Tale of Tales appeared at a time when international efforts toward the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) began to accelerate with the passage of numerous international agreements in the 1970s, building to near universal consensus on the need for the Convention and culminating in a International Year of the Child in 1979. The CRC was eventually passed by the UN General Assembly in 1989.    Bashu, the Little Stranger, Iran, 1986A dazed and traumatized boy emerges from a truck thousands of miles from his war-ravaged town near the Iran-Iraq battlefront of the 1980s. Little Bashu finds himself in Northern Iran, haunted by the spirits of his deceased mother and family members and unable to understand a single word of the local dialect (Gilaki). Taunted for his dark skin and seemingly alien ways by the villagers, he is taken in by Naii, a mother of two children trying to manage the family farm while her husband is far away in the war. Considered by many as one of the most powerful Iranian feature films of the time, director Bahram Beyzai successfully portrays an ostracized child with dignity and dimensionality, while revealing the problem of racial and ethnic prejudice. At a time of growing awareness of and concern about the dramatic increase in the number of civilian casualties of armed conflict, with disastrous implications for children, Bashu, the Little Stranger tells an important story about overcoming differences.   </div><p> </p> <p> </p> <h3>La Petite Vendeuse de Soleil, Senegal, 1999</h3> <p>Sili, an adolescent with a disability in Dakar, decides she will be the first girl to sell <em>Le Soleil</em>, the national daily newspaper – a job ruled by boys. Even though she is repeatedly harassed and mistreated by the boys, Sili overcomes her challenges with unruffled confidence. Despite having only made two features and five short films, Senegalese filmmaker <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djibril_Diop_Mamb%C3%A9ty">Djibril Diop Mambéty</a> caught the attention of the film world several times before he died in 1998. <em>La Petite Vendeuse de Soleil</em> (<em>The Little Girl Who Sold the Sun</em>) attracted wide acclaim at the Berlin, Toronto, Hong Kong and Rotterdam international film festivals when it was released in 1999, and broke new ground by featuring the story of a disabled child. While UNICEF continues to work and advocate for children with disabilities, far too many are still denied a fair chance to make their dreams real or to be included as equal participants in their communities, as recognized in the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with disabilities. </p> <div class="iframe-container"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ByXuk9QqQkk" title="YouTube video player" width="560"> Spirited Away, Japan, 2001While driving to their new home in a faraway town, nine-year-old Chihiro’s family falls into a mystical world populated by humans and Kami, the traditional Japanese spirits of the natural world. To rescue her parents and safeguard her future, Chihiro embarks on an epic journey, one that will test her judgment, courage and loyalty. That said, Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki’s masterpiece, Spirited Away – an enormously popular film that remains one of the top grossing Japanese feature films of all time – defies any simple description. It combines the highest art of storytelling with a deep meditation of complex themes: the transition from child to adult; resistance to consumerism; and respect for the natural world. Appearing at a time when UNICEF and others started focusing more attention on adolescent health and skills, it speaks to those same themes. “It's not a story in which the characters grow up, but a story in which they draw on something already inside them, brought out by the particular circumstances.”— Hayao Miyazaki.    La Jaula de Oro, Guatemala/Mexico, 2010Despite the dangers, Samuel, a rag picker, Chauk, an indigenous boy, and Sara – disguised as a boy named Osvaldo – are determined to leave Guatemala for the US. After crossing the Mexican border by boat, the trio hop on slow moving trains headed north. Along the way, they are exposed to violent police, drug cartels and petty criminals, all looking to deceive or exploit them. Only one of the three survives the journey. Screened at Cannes Film Festival’s 2013 “Un Certain Regard” showcase, The Golden Cage (distributed in the US as The Golden Dream) received notable attention. Diego Quemada-Diaz won awards for best director and best ensemble cast (played by young non-professional actors). Shot in Guatemala and Mexico, the film offers a stark look at what happens to the thousands of unaccompanied minors who still undertake this same journey today. When the film opened, the news of surges of unaccompanied minors arriving at the US border began to hit the headlines, foreshadowing an even larger version of the same humanitarian crisis affecting Europe in 2015. The film authentically portrays children on the move in the 21st century, providing an unflinching revelation of the danger and trauma these young people are exposed to and the depths of their determination to move. (Please note: The UNICEF Innocenti Film Festival, 2nd edition is being held in theater at Cinema La Compagnia and online 21 - 24 October 2021. In 2021 UIFF presents 38 films from 29 countries touching on the exhileration, the pain the joys and the dangers of childhood).Dale Rutstein is the Chief of Communication for UNICEF Innocenti and Coordinator of the UNICEF Innocenti Film Festival  which showcases cinema narratives of childhood from all parts of the world. 

Just as the coronavirus outbreak reached its peak in the Italian province of Lombardy a group of health care professionals, many with Papa Giovanni XXIII hospital in Bergamo, published a short commentary which caught the attention of staff at the UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti in Florence. Their simple message: COVID-19 was decimating their whole town and therefore required a completely new way of fighting the disease and its multiple side-effects ripping through their community. Bergamo is a picturesque city in the Lombardy Region of Northern Italy. Its immediate surroundings form part of one of the richest and most industrialized areas in Europe. Not far from the buzzing urban centre of Milan, Bergamo is also adjacent to a series of alpine valleys near the Swiss border where, by contrast, rural communities and their traditions are well preserved. A dark nightmareIn mid-February, this peaceful community, with a pragmatic approach to life and deep-rooted traditions of care for others, plummeted into a dark nightmare whose end is still unknown. Even with one of the best standards of medical care in Europe, COVID-19 has completely overwhelmed Bergamo’s healthcare systems. The latest report of the National Institute of Statistics on mortality in Italy, based on data obtained from municipal registries, indicates that in March 2020, 5,400 persons died in Bergamo. Of this number, 4,500 deaths were apparently due to coronavirus. As reported by the local newspaper the total number of deaths is six times the number of deaths registered in the same period in 2019. The number of infected people is probably far higher than what is reported by official statistics, which are based on COVID-19 tests performed only in hospitals on symptomatic patients. According to the Italian Civil Protection agency, in March the province of Bergamo had 2,080 deaths and 8,803 infections confirmed by test swabs. Incredibly, by these statistics, the COVID-19 fatality rate in Bergamo is many times higher than the global fatality rate estimated by Imperial College London, published in The Lancet. In Bergamo almost every household contains or knows of someone who has either died or is fighting for their life due to the virus. The town has become well-known throughout Italy for the sad daily ritual of Italian military trucks transporting coffins to other regions. Local cemeteries and mortuaries in Bergamo were completely overwhelmed several weeks ago.Doctors and nurses working non-stop at the ICU of the Hospital of Vizzolo Predabissi, in Lombardy.Focus on households and communitiesIn this unimaginable situation, each day doctors and nurses repeat a titanic and unparalleled effort against the virus. In the midst of this tragedy a group of physicians, community workers and local agencies set up a ‘multidisciplinary task force’ to reflect on Bergamo’s circumstances as the epicenter of the pandemic. When the authors of this piece began to contact them to find out what lessons they might share for countries yet to follow in their path, a series of important, yet less considered ideas began to emerge. First, they consider this pandemic a humanitarian crisis which requires new actions, new models, new thinking for them as well as for the international community and humanitarian agencies. Following the traditional patient-centered approach to care is no longer enough. A community-centered care approach is needed to respond to the challenges that the emergency is posing. Developing a sustainable model can be crucially important project for the entire world, Bergamo being, at this moment, arguably among the hardest hit cities in the world. One of the first lessons they shared was the absolute necessity to reverse the ingrained idea that the hospital is where you should rush for urgent care. All too often, families repeated the mistake of speeding family members struggling to breath to the hospital, only to be engulfed in the most contagious environment possible. In Bergamo the health care community quickly realized that aggressive community-based measures were needed to identify and keep moderate cases best suited to recovery at home, as far away from the hospital as possible. From the start it became clear that households played a central role in the community response. Children - the hidden victimsIn such a dramatic situation, children and their families – especially the most vulnerable and fragile –quickly become the ‘hidden-victims’ of this crisis. Not considered at high risk of succumbing to the virus, nevertheless urgent measures to support a range of spill-over effects had to be put in place. Municipal governments and civil society groups together with psychological and health services have started to implement various channels of remote response to emerging needs. They are focusing first on relatives of hospitalized patients and health workers (“Curare chi cura”). They are also working to ensure continuity of care for vulnerable persons and children with disabilities already being assisted by health services.A family in Bergamo, Italy made a rainbow out of clothes hung outside her house, involving their children and the next door neighbours. The message on the flag says: "Courage Italy".A team of pediatric psychiatrists, also based at Papa Giovanni XXIII hospital, has conceptualized (for discussion) an ecological model to promote and support protective factors for children based on three main strands: family, community and schools. Central to this approach is the concept that the adults in children’s lives are the primary channel for most forms of care and support. In a Bergamo-type scenario almost everyone who is sick with something other than COVID-19 is unable to receive medical treatment. The implications of this are horrifying for everyone, but for children, especially vulnerable children, this can equate to lifelong consequences. This situation offers perhaps the most powerful argument of all for staying home at all costs and reducing the chance of a broken bone or a bicycle accident leading to a hospital trip and almost certain exposure of the virus. Care for children by supporting caregiversIt is crucial to look at stressors on caregivers, teachers and child social service providers and to strengthen networks across families, local institutions (municipalities), schools, social workers and physicians. These networks must be supported to maximize efforts to reach not only those children who are already receiving medical and social support, but also those children at risk of becoming invisible without a system in place to help and support them before their conditions become pathological. Many children in Bergamo live in families that have experienced one or more deaths. While grieving over lost family members, they live in fear of more infections along with deep anxiety over the loss of household income. In this setting children’s emotional needs often fade from view. They do not have adequate opportunities to be heard, and often refrain from asking questions to avoid increasing the burden on their parents. They cannot share their own fears with friends at school or mitigate them by playing with classmates. Largely, they remain unheard, while adults try to cope with multiple difficulties at the same time. Adolescents and young people may feel a sense of pride in their ability to help their families and community to adjust to the online reality they now all live in. Bergamo pediatric psychiatrists observe that for some adolescents, familiarity with the internet appears to be more like an asset that is keeping them connected with friends, social networks and information. For those who do show signs of distress, services providers are creating networks to share resources and knowledge to better target and differentiate their interventions. Within these networks, pediatricians will play a critical role in early warning of signs of distress. Mental health - before, during and afterwardsBergamo mental health specialists highlight the importance of strengthening communication between hospital staff and family. Families are bombarded with life and death situations affecting their loved ones and there is an urgent need for hospital staff trained to inform families of critical situations in the most sensitive manner combined with the offer of psychological support. Often this can be a crucial first step in restoring a sense of community, as well as a means of addressing emotions and concerns for the entire family. Building and strengthening a sense of community is also an important component in overcoming the barrier of stigma associated with revealing one’s weakness or the need for help. This can be a challenging social norm in places like Bergamo, often preventing people from asking for the support they need and worsening household circumstances where vulnerable children live. The Bergamo team proposes that a pool of institutions and representatives serving various sectors of the community develop a "Charter to live with COVID-19" – at both the community and family levels – to engage the whole community, down to the household level, and to promote use of the resources put in place by the various stakeholders, in most cases on the internet. The ‘Community Charter’ would promote solidarity and support to alleviate the burden of a health crisis which has also become a social and economic crisis. It would prioritize and make more accessible concrete services to cope with the emergency, including economic and psycho-social support.A 7 year old boy does homework that his teachers sent to his parents via WhatsApp, Rome , Italy.The ‘Family Charter,’ on the other hand, should locate and identify fragile families and parents, helping them with concrete suggestions on how to support their children, maintain routines, and organize moments of lightness together. It would help parents and caregivers to acquire the necessary skills to recognize signals of distress in children which would require referral. Crucial in this work will be building multiple layers of support for parents who have been serving as nurturers, caregivers, teachers, counselors and supporters of children and young people. Schools intersect all children's livesLastly, school is the one agency that intersects the lives of almost all children. Health professionals say they have not observed significant disparities in learning during the period of school closure, due, in their view, to Bergamo’s very high standard of living. But the true picture of educational disparity could be unclear, with all attention still on saving human lives. However, educational authorities need to start thinking about how to support children when they come back to class. And teachers will need enormous support as they come in contact with the social and emotional trauma on children who have spent months in quarantine as family and friends succumbed around them. For many children, especially for the most vulnerable and fragile, schools represent the only familiar and constant space for social and emotional support. Planning a shared community moment at the beginning of the next school year can provide an opportunity to talk about what occurred and to empathetically listen to everyone's stories. The lead author of the paper referenced in the beginning of this narrative emphasizes that concerted international humanitarian response is needed in places like Bergamo. He also warns that the coronavirus outbreak should not be confused with an earthquake. The symptom profile and population dynamics of the contagion requires a prolonged multi-sectoral, multi-phase response that could take quite different forms along the way.A home visit physician visiting a COVID-19 patient with mild symptoms at his home in Lombardy.Summary of lessons on caring for children and families – Outlined by Bergamo health workersThe symptom profile and trajectory of COVID-19 makes it almost impossible for existing data systems to explain the true scope of the problem;The virus cannot be fought with a patient focused approach to care; it can only be attacked effectively with a community care approach;Children and families are not the most vulnerable to COVID-19 contagion, but they are vulnerable to being hidden or sidelined in the worst hit communities;It is essential to reverse the ingrained response that the hospital is where people should rush for urgent care as they become the most dangerous hotbeds of infection, and where children can easily become asymptomatic cases;Children (and adults) who are sick with anything other than COVID-19 will almost certainly be neglected; perhaps the most compelling reason to remain at home and minimize the chance of an accident or injury that would ordinarily lead to a hospital visit;Focus on stressors affecting parents, caregivers, teachers and child social service providers and strengthen networks that support them across families, local institutions (municipalities), schools, social workers and physicians;Keep children’s emotional needs uppermost and ensure they have space to express their opinions and that they are encouraged to do so. High standards of living and low inequality are no assurance that educational equity is being maintained during school closure;Adolescents may feel a sense of pride in their ability to help family members adjust to the new reality of a fully online community; often their deep experience with online interaction can be a powerful source for connection, social networks and vital information for themselves and their families;Prioritize training of hospital staff in sensitive communication with loved ones following the death of a relative as this has been observed to mitigate the impact of intense grief on children and families;Even in such a devastating period social stigma against expressing weakness or asking for assistance can be a severe obstacle to working through households to address the needs of children;Establishing a ‘Charter to Live with COVID-19’ can be a powerful tool for communities and families to assert their determination to survive and focus on the needs of the most vulnerable members of their homes and neighborhoods;Provide support to adults who will be called on to shoulder far more that their usual responsibilities as they must be the hands that health, social work, education and protection services for children are delivered during quarantine;Teachers and schools provide a crucial continuum of support that often goes far beyond learning both during quarantine and in the very sensitive period immediately afterwards. They need more support that is commonly considered at this stage.Patrizia Faustini is Sr Communication Associate and Dale Rutstein is Chief of Communication at the UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti. The writers would like to acknowledge the following physical and mental health professionals of Bergamo who generously contributed their insights and their precious time during the worst health crisis to hit their community in centuries. Susanna Ambrosino, Psychologist; Lorella Giuliana Caffi,  Child Neuropsychiatrist; Andrea Ciocca, Project Coordinator; Sara Forlani, Child Neuropsychiatrist; Donatella Fusari, Physiotherapist; Ludovica Ghilardi, Research Fellow, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine; Claudia Guuva, Child Neuropsychiatrist; Francesca Lesmo, Psychologist; Michela Marzaroli, Child Neuropsychiatrist; Mirco Nacoti, MD, Anesthesia and Intensive Care; Anna Polo Resmi, Child Neuropsychiatrist; Anna Maria Scioti, Psychologist; Patrizia Maria Carla Stoppa, Child Neuropsychiatrist. 

As a UNICEF communicator I’d bet that the widespread acceptance of corporal punishment – spanking, slapping, hitting, etc., a practice that seems to cross all boundaries – is one of the toughest challenges we face. Indeed, despite near universal ratification of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, only 8% of the world’s children are fully protected from being physically abused by adults. Why is corporal punishment unquestioned by so many? Answers may be in short supply, but a new discussion paper from the UNICEF Office of Research, Corporal Punishment in Schools: Longitudinal evidence from Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam sheds important new light on the terrible damage this practice inflicts on children in the course of their education. Produced by the Young Lives Longitudinal Study on Child Poverty as part of the Office of Research multi-country study on violence affecting children, the paper gives a rare look at how teacher punishment in school affects children over time. The evidence is quite clear, with negative impacts observed at age 12, especially in decreased math scores, among many of the children who had experienced corporal punishment at age 8, compared with those who had not experienced it. These findings have been extensively controlled for community factors and previous school performance. The study also presents data which underlines how widespread corporal punishment can be. Among the 12,000 children studied from half to ninety percent, depending on the country, reported seeing a teacher beating a student in the last week. Whether in schools or elsewhere, the practice of adults beating children still sparks heated debate. In 2014 one of the top professional football players in the US was arrested for severely whipping his four-year-old child with a tree branch. The player claimed he was practicing a form of discipline that had been common in his family for generations. The incident dominated the US news media for weeks. It also sparked spirited discussion about corporal punishment across the internet. Soon a widely admired sports commentator defended the practice of whipping as a culturally accepted practice in certain regions of the country. I decided to take to Twitter. I started posting about the need to use this national discussion on adults beating children to eliminate the terrible practice from all parts of society. To my surprise, this was one of the few times my humble twitter following came alive with a number of voices strongly in support of beating children in order to discipline them. I recalled similar discussions in various cultural contexts around the world. When planning UNICEF’s violence against children programme in a large Asian country, our partners thought it best not to make corporal punishment the lead focus. They argued the campaign would not get off the ground if that were the dominant theme because most parents regarded physical punishment as a non-negotiable part of good child rearing. The new discussion paper produced by the Young Lives team is a powerful tool in the hands of anyone eager to eliminate corporal punishment of children. The authors report the negative impact of corporal punishment on academic performance is equal to the deficit seen when a child’s mother has 3 to 6 fewer years formal education. Corporal Punishment in Schools highlights the power of longitudinal data to help connect the dots on children’s experiences. If the trauma imposed on children by teachers resorting to corporal punishment is not enough to banish the practice, perhaps its negative impact on test scores will be. Sadly it may be necessary to amass a lot more evidence on how corporal punishment diminishes children’s life chances before it is more widely challenged as an acceptable practice. Dale Rutstein is Chief of Communication at the UNICEF Office of Research-Innocenti      

The Office of Research – Innocenti has just released the third edition of its annual publication Best of UNICEF Research 2015. With each edition we learn more about a key element in a global development organization’s effort to gather evidence. Over the course of its existence Best of UNICEF Research has grown in terms of the quality of research represented, the range and complexity of research questions addressed and in the programmatic and geographic scope of the submissions. Research is an essential part of UNICEF’s effort to improve the situation of the world’s children. Quality data gathering, appraisal and analysis can fuel informed decision making and planning, assess intervention impact, question practices and improve policy discourse. High quality research is carried out across the full breadth of UNICEF offices and locations. But often, especially in country offices, it is undertaken with a sharp focus on how it can support programmes for children in particular contexts. Best of UNICEF Research is now a vital tool for increasing organization-wide learning and sharing about quality research.   Read the report here. Best of UNICEF Research is also an important exercise in recognizing excellence. Through it we are also identifying many useful lessons about how a decentralized global development organization generates and uses evidence. Everyone engaged in delivering results for children can gain valuable lessons on methods, models and good practices for research. And the timing couldn’t be better. With development cooperation moving upstream we are increasingly asked to assist in the generation of evidence to improve policies and programmes funded and administered by local authorities. We highly recommend a full read of the Best of UNICEF Research 2015. It provides short synopses of the 12 research projects that emerged from this year’s rigorous selection process. These projects cover traditional and emerging programme areas. They range in geographic focus from global to regional to country level and cover a wide array of research questions, topics and approaches. In order to whet your appetite here is a quick overview of the Best of UNICEF research 2015: Reducing Newborn Deaths is a systematic assessment of bottlenecks to scaling up essential maternal and newborn healthcare in eight of the countries with the highest number of neonatal deaths. Sanitation in Mali documents the use of a randomized control trial to assess the impact of the well-known “Community Led Total Sanitation” approach to reducing open defecation. Early Childhood Development in East Asia and the Pacific is a multi-year evaluation effort across six countries to test the validity of a region-wide early childhood development scale which measures progress in seven development domains. Emergency Preparedness conducts a rigorous return on investment analysis of emergency preparedness measures in Chad, Madagascar and Pakistan. Child Poverty in South Africa analyzes a wide range of data sources to determine the extent to which children have been caught in poverty traps and recommends interventions to escape the cycle. Food and Nutrition Policy presents a theory-based rapid assessment model for assessing a national government’s commitment to food and nutrition security. Teacher Incentives in Namibia evaluates a scheme to attract qualified teachers to work in rural communities through the provision of financial incentives. Violence in Serbian Schools is one of the largest school surveys ever conducted in that country and gathered data on context-relevant indicators of school violence. Child Grants Lesotho evaluates unconditional cash transfers presenting evidence on a range of positive impacts and making specific policy recommendations. Water and Health Worldwide is a global review to assess the validity of one of the most important indicators for safe drinking water evaluating data from 319 studies representing almost 100,000 water sources. Education in Romania provides an in-depth analysis of the level of public expenditure in education and provides a useful example of how research can support policies on quality and equity in schooling. Violence Against Children in ASEAN Countries assesses the level of compliance of national legislation on violence against children in ten member countries in this sub-region. We hope you find these examples of new UNICEF research inspiring – whether for the relevance of the findings to your work, or as illuminating examples of how good research, carefully designed to address relevant and timely questions, can accelerate efforts to shape a better future for children everywhere. Follow me on Twitter @dalerutstein

UNICEF is well known for its role in responding to complex humanitarian crises affecting children around the world. The work of the UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti, based at the 600-year-old Ospedale degli Innocenti, in Florence, Italy rarely hits world headlines. Yet over the quarter century of its existence UNICEF at Innocenti has produced ground-breaking analytical work which has informed action and shifted global development discourse on critical child rights issues. In order to mark its 25th Anniversary, the Office recently convened a special anniversary seminar to reflect on achievements and look toward future directions for research at Innocenti. In its historic Renaissance surroundings former directors and senior researchers, together with a constellation of local and national Italian partners, shared their experiences and insights. On behalf of the Italian Government, the Office’s most generous financial donor, Luca Zelioli, First Counsellor, Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, delivered opening remarks. Jim Grant, Former UNICEF Executive Director and Jim Himes, first Director of UNICEF's International Child Development Centre in front of the Ospedale degli Innocenti in Florence, Italy (Circa 1988) Inaugurated in 1988 as the UNICEF International Child Development Centre, with a broad mandate to contribute to an “emerging global ethic for children,” research quickly became a defining mission and the institution’s name soon evolved to Innocenti Research Centre, and finally to the UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti. “When we moved here these were turbulent years, the Berlin Wall was falling, adjustment in Africa was not working so there was a lost decade in Africa and Latin America and there was a big debate on how to finance health, education and nutrition in developing countries,” recalled Giovanni Andrea Cornia, UNICEF’s first Chief of Socio-Economic Policy at Innocenti (1989 – 1995). During years of global economic recession Innocenti produced a succession of important studies in Africa and Latin America which provided an evidence base for UNICEF’s global call for “adjustment with a human face.” Following ratification of the Convention of the Rights of the Child, a range of research projects at Innocenti contributed significantly in shaping UNICEF’s adoption of the human rights-based approach to development. Innocenti pioneered much early work on child protection. Numerous studies focused on what were deemed “emerging issues” in the 1990’s such as child trafficking, children in conflict with the law and child labour. Research on the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child conducted at Innocenti allowed UNICEF to explore aspects of children’s development which were considered sensitive or taboo subjects in various cultural and national contexts. According to Nigel Cantwell, child protection expert and former senior officer (1998–2003), Innocenti has explored themes leading the global discourse on children’s issues, often producing work which pushed a range of sensitive child rights issues into the mainstream of global programming and service delivery. “Juvenile justice is an area where there is often a total lack of understanding as to what actually works in terms of preventing and responding to offending by young people,” said Cantwell. “Juvenile justice has become more integrated into UNICEF programming, and I think that Innocenti helped to pave the way for it to gradually move out of the sensitive issue area.” Sarah Cook (L) Director of the UNICEF Office of Research - Innocenti introducing a panel of former Innocenti Directors and Senior Researchers, (L_R) Mehr Khan-Williamson, Nigel Cantwell, Giovanni Andrea Cornia and Gordon Alexander at the UNICEF Innocenti 25th Anniversary Seminar in Florence, Italy. Panellists highlighted the important benefits of a UNICEF research centre located apart from headquarters, empowered to pursue an independent research agenda. Gordon Alexander, recently retired Director (2010–2013) pointed out Innocenti’s unique ability to take a long-term, multi-disciplinary approach to knowledge on children. “There are very few places in the world where research for children in all its dimensions actually comes together. I think that is something that is very special to Innocenti.” In recent years, Innocenti has played a leading role in improving social and economic policy for vulnerable children in both poor and rich countries. The Innocenti Report Card series, based on league tables which compare child well-being among OECD nations, has risen in prominence to become one of UNICEF’s most visible flagship publications. Through the Report Card, Innocenti has expanded substantive advocacy for vulnerable children in the developed world with UNICEF’s network of National Committees. Mehr Khan-Williamson, former Innocenti Director (1998–2000), reflected on the challenges she faced initiating the series. “Starting the Report Cards was not easy…these were Board Members, they were donor countries and we are an inter-governmental organization and not much can be said to those who are also feeding you. But the issues were essential and they had to be dealt with.” Reflecting on the emergence of Innocenti’s current incarnation, Gordon Alexander recalled how the Executive Board defined its current mission. “UNICEF has always been right at the heart of research, in many areas. It was a tremendous user and a convener of research and occasionally it did brilliant pieces of research. But there was never a permanent home for research, and that is what gave rise to the idea of linking the work of Innocenti with the more global approach.” Today at Innocenti UNICEF plays a critical evidence gathering and knowledge building role on a wide range of cutting-edge children’s issues. It is a leading centre on impact evaluation of cash transfers. It coordinates multi-country research on the drivers of violence affecting children. It plays a central role in adolescent well-being, child rights and the internet, child rights implementation, family and parenting support policy and multi-dimensional child poverty analysis. A special 25th Anniversary e-publication “Children and Research at Innocenti: 25 years of UNICEF Commitment” was formally launched in both English and Italian at the Seminar. It is an invaluable small volume for anyone seeking the story of how UNICEF’s presence at Innocenti emerged and evolved over the last 25 years. Follow me on Twitter: @dalerutstein

Almost half of all women in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa are married before eighteen. Globally, adolescents are two times more likely to be out of school than primary school aged children. Nearly eight million 15-24-year-olds in Europe are not in education, employment or training. Is it time to ask the question: “Are we failing adolescents?” The 2012 Lancet Series on adolescent health highlighted the links between “structural determinants” – national wealth, inequality and education systems – and adolescent outcomes. At the same time, growing awareness of the links between social determinants – beliefs, attitudes and cultural norms – and adolescent wellbeing has not always been accompanied by sufficient understanding of how or when to intervene. If we are not intentionally failing adolescents we may well be failing to look at the issues and vulnerabilities facing them in the right way. Can we end child marriage simply by increasing the legal age for marriage? Can we expect to address youth unemployment by encouraging job training? Adolescence is intensive, often bringing on work, sexual debut, marriage and parenthood. Does this interaction sound familiar? Researcher:                “What is the right age for marriage?” Mother:                       “At age eighteen. That’s the law.” Researcher:                “When did your own daughter get married?” Mother:                       “I think she was thirteen or fourteen.” Researcher:                “Why didn’t you allow her to stay in school?” Mother:                       “Then she would never find a husband.” Newly arrived unaccompanied minors from South Sudan wait as they undergo registration in Kule camp, Ethiopia. © UNICEF/NYHQ2014-1545/OseThe very notion of adolescence is fuzzy. Is it a function of age, social convention, puberty? Some cultures may not even recognize it as a distinct life stage. As a result, public programmes and support services are often weak and disjointed. The development community is coming around to the notion that quick fixes for assuring adolescents’ safe transition to adulthood are elusive. But, there is a dearth of evidence-based approaches that consider all dimensions. This is partly because we still have not learned how the different and dynamic elements in a young person’s life interact. What is needed is a fundamental re-think of efforts to support adolescent health and well-being based on sound analysis of how structural realities – school systems, social norms, livelihoods – play out. Narrowing the focus on adolescent girls, the new edition of the Innocenti’s Research Watch debate brings together top experts from Oxford University, the Population Council and the Lancet Commission, to drill down into the bedrock assumptions and structures which underpin often inadequate efforts to protect them. The resulting 20-minute web-video moderated by BBC’s David Eades is a must see for anyone seeking deeper insight, based on the latest research and inquiry, into the cultural and structural determinants of adolescent well-being. As with all editions of Research Watch, global researchers have contributed written commentaries on critical emerging issues. The latest edition’s commentaries address: the adolescent brain, working with boys to close the gender gap, adolescence and poverty, adolescent girl’s migration, new findings on adolescence from cohort research and much more. Last year the UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti initiated a global research partnership funded by DFID, the Italian Government and others to research the structural and social determinants of adolescent well-being in low and middle-income countries. Initially, the partnership will focus on Ethiopia, Malawi, Italy, Peru, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Key partners include Addis Ababa University, International Centre for Research on Women, Lancet Commission on Adolescent Health, Pontifical Catholic University of Peru, University of Edinburgh – Child Protection Research Centre, University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, University of Oxford, Young Lives – International Longitudinal Study on Child Poverty, and others. Follow me on twitter: @dalerutstein

A new working paper called 'Analysing child poverty and deprivation in sub-Saharan Africa' has been published by the UNICEF Office of Research - Innocenti. The paper uses a framework called 'MODA' designed to measure multidimensional poverty specifically for children within and across countries. We caught up with Sudhanshu Handa, Chief of Social and Economic Policy at the UNICEF Office of Research to learn about the paper’s new findings and the strategy behind its unique analysis.   Can you tell us what MODA is in simple terms? MODA stands for “multiple overlapping deprivation analysis.” The MODA methodology has been developed to more accurately define and measure child poverty both at a national and international level, taking into consideration the complex, multifaceted realities of poverty which children experience at different stages of their lives.   What are the major new things we have learned with this paper on sub-Saharan Africa? This is the first study to quantify the number and depth of multi-dimensional child poverty in sub-Saharan Africa using data on individual children. In the 30 countries for which comparable data are available, 86 per cent of children below age 18 suffer from at least one deprivation, and even more serious, 23 per cent of children suffer from 4 or 5 deprivations simultaneously—approximately 87m children. These are the first such estimates for sub-Saharan Africa. How will this push policy and service provision forward? The cross-country analysis in this paper is aimed at understanding the overall picture of child deprivations and their distribution in sub-Saharan Africa, in part to signal to the global development community the extent of the problem. Nevertheless, even this cross-country comparative analysis holds some interesting policy implications.   Can you give a specific example? For example, while nutrition deprivation rates are about the same in urban and rural areas of sub-Saharan Africa, the overlap between nutrition and other deprivations is significantly higher in rural areas. In other words, nutrition deprivation in urban areas is often a stand-alone problem, and better addressed through a sector approach. In rural areas, on the other hand, a multi-sector approach to addressing malnutrition is likely to be a more cost-effective approach. The second key finding with policy implications is the fact that country child poverty rankings differ depending on whether one uses monetary or multi-dimensional child poverty as the yardstick. This highlights the need to go beyond simple monetary measures when assessing child well-being.   How will this help governments in sub-Saharan Africa to address child poverty going forward? The multidimensional approach allows governments to pinpoint exactly which specific deprivations - health, nutrition, water, housing - are most critical for children. And by looking at overlaps among dimensions, governments can assess whether a sector or multi-sector approach would be more cost-effective in addressing child poverty. Finally, the study highlights the important difference between monetary versus deprivation approaches to measuring child poverty. For children, knowing the exact deprivations they suffer allows precise identification of interventions that will directly address child suffering. Multidimensional poverty analysis is not new. How is MODA new or different? Most poverty scholars and practitioners have heard of the Multidimensional Poverty Index or MPI, a popular measure of poverty that goes beyond income to look at deprivations in domains such as water, housing, education, and health. Well, MODA can be viewed as the child version of the MPI. The indicators that go into MODA are selected for their relevance for child well-being, and are measured for children, not for households as is done in the MPI. This is a key distinction and the main innovation of MODA. Consequently, it allows us to measure child deprivation directly. Because the tool measures deprivations for each individual child, it enables us to also observe children with multiple deprivations—extremely important from an equity standpoint. This is the second major innovation of MODA.   How will it improve policy for fighting child poverty? Note that non-income components of well-being are arguably much more important for children, which makes the development of this tool that much more essential for tackling child poverty. First, household income is not under the control of children, so there is no guarantee that just because a household has sufficient income that children get what they need to thrive. And many items that enter into a multidimensional index such as clean water or nutrition have long lasting effects on child development. For children, these things are the ultimate objective of development—not income. Thus, the deprivation approach is more relevant for children than it is for households. MODA allows us to measure these deprivations among children themselves. How would MODA help programmes be more effective? This tool can inform programmes in two ways. First, by accurately assessing deprivations, it allows countries to identify the most important deprivations facing children—this would inform decisions about what to focus on (which sectors to prioritize). Second, by measuring multiple overlapping deprivations, the tool allows governments to identify who to focus on—the most deprived, or those with the most rights violations, which is consistent with the Human Rights Based Approach to Programming (HRBAP). MODA is thus fully consistent with the HRBAP which is the core guiding principle for UNICEF’s work.   Can you give a simple example of how policymakers might use this new information? For example, in Mali the highest rates of child deprivation are found in Tombouctou and Kidal, regions which do not have the highest monetary poverty rates. Hence, the tool shows us where to start in order to combat child deprivation directly. The Mali analysis also shows that for children age 0-23 months the highest single deprivation is nutrition. For children age 5-14 years, on the other hand, the highest single deprivation is child labour. These clearly direct us to the sectors that need to be addressed to tackle age-specific child deprivation. A student cleans a chalkboard at a school in Bamako, Mali. ©UNICEF/MLIA2012-00887/Bindra Tell us more about the MODA tool. Why was it developed? MODA is a tool developed by UNICEF’s Office of Research - Innocenti, with support from the Division of Policy and Strategy, to enhance the equity focus of child poverty and deprivation analyses around the world. It is a contribution to global efforts to generate quality evidence on child poverty and disparities. It recognises that a child's experience of deprivations is multi-faceted and interrelated, and that such multiple, overlapping deprivations are more likely to occur, and with greater adverse effects, in more socio-economically disadvantaged groups.   How is MODA different from other methods of measuring multidimensional poverty? MODA builds on UNICEF's Global Study on Child Poverty and Disparities, Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative’s Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI), and other research carried out in the field of multidimensional poverty. It has several features that we can say distinguish it from most existing analytical frameworks. As mentioned, it selects the child as the unit of analysis, rather than the household, since children experience poverty differently from adults especially with regards to developmental needs. Of course, it uses a life-cycle approach that reflects the different needs of early childhood, primary childhood and adolescence. It also measures monetary poverty and multidimensional deprivations simultaneously for each child whenever the data used has information on both. Finally, it helps to force the development world and governments away from the typical “silo” approach. When we can generate better pictures of how multiple deprivations affect individual children, it becomes much clearer how and where different actors must work together to defeat multidimensional child poverty.   A series of briefs on how the cross-country component of MODA was used to produce the new paper on child deprivations in sub-Saharan Africa is available for those who want to drill down further. You can also access the online portal for MODA here: http://www.unicef-irc.org/MODA/

UNICEF staff are so preoccupied with the increasingly complex task of assisting the most vulnerable children that they don’t often realize the extent and quality of research their offices and programmes throughout the world carry out. UNICEF is actually a major global research organization with hundreds of research projects carried out each year to underpin its programmes, policy and advocacy work. Its work addresses new and emerging development challenges, and advances knowledge on children with relevance often well beyond the local country context. In order to showcase the best of all UNICEF research efforts, the Office of Research-Innocenti undertakes an annual selection process carried out across the organization: in country and regional offices, at headquarters divisions and National Committees. This year 79 entries were officially submitted and a total of 65 met the publicized acceptance standard developed for the process. The range of themes covered and geographic representation among the finalists was impressive. Following a rigorous internal review process twelve finalist entries were shortlisted for special recognition from a very strong group of submissions. Summaries of these twelve research studies have now been published by the UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti, and are officially part of its catalogue. These 12 finalists were further reviewed by an independent panel of experts who are familiar with UNICEF research but do not work for the organization. They highlighted the finalists below: the first two for their potential for impact, two for policy relevance, and the last two for merit and policy relevance at the country level. Here they are described in the words of the external assessors: The Adolescent girls vulnerability index (Uganda): “Its strength is in the pioneering of the development of an adolescent girls’ vulnerability index and the potential for it to be replicated across countries and allow for an objective comparison measure.” Zambia: Social Cash Transfer 24 Month Impact Report: “This innovative piece of research evaluating a non-conditional cash transfer scheme was carried out with a well-developed conceptual framework, presenting complex, insightful and policy-relevant findings in an engaging and articulate manner.” Preventing Exclusion from the child support grant (South Africa): “The study uses a strong design and has the potential to be replicated in other settings to identify factors that influence social assistance exclusion.” Effects of the Palestinian National Cash Transfer Programme on children and adolescents: “A major strength is the mixed methods approach starting with quantitative data contrasting intervention and comparison groups followed by qualitative data using purposive selection and participatory approaches.” Effect of Iron Deficiency Anaemia in pregnancy on child mental development in Rural China: “This very focused study - published in the journal Paediatrics - takes a longitudinal observational approach to explore the effect of iron deficiency anaemia among mothers on cognitive and mental development of their children.” Policy Impact Analysis: Additional support to students from vulnerable groups in Pre-university education (Serbia): “In many ways, this is a bold and path-breaking piece, and highly relevant within Serbia’s current political and social policy agendas. The study combines a mix of very detailed mapping of institutional initiatives within the country and comparative analysis of evidence of education reform in OECD countries applied to the Serbian context.” You can find the complete Best of UNICEF Research 2014 publication with summaries of the 12 shortlisted works here, on the UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti website, with links to the full research papers.

Just over six years since the sudden collapse of Lehman Brothers, the global economic crisis still makes news throughout the world. The impact on households goes beyond headlines. Hardly any family has not felt the pain of the Great Recession. Children of course experience it most acutely. They are also at greatest risk of suffering lasting damage from it. Lasting damage could well be the dominant theme of the new Innocenti Report Card “Children of the Recession: The impact of the economic crisis on child well-being in rich countries.” The Innocenti Report Card is the one UNICEF flagship publication devoted to children in the developed world. This Report Card does not deliver many passing grades. It offers a sobering look at how child poverty has changed compared to fixed 2008 levels, introducing a more sensitive measure of how children have fared since that critical point. There is real concern that widening poverty gaps, young people not in education, employment or training and staggering declines in years of income progress are causing long term structural changes that will set children back significantly in the developed world. In 23 out of 41 countries child poverty has increased. In a number of countries the increases were sizable, especially in the Mediterranean region. In 18 countries child poverty declined, but these are mostly the smaller economies in the group, with a notable exception being Germany. Unusual, even for the Innocenti Report Card series, is a special section ranking US States’ changes in child poverty. There are some surprising results. US economic stimulus worked fairly well and most likely prevented large numbers of children from falling into poverty. In some traditionally poorer States like Mississippi and West Virginia, child poverty improved, while going up significantly in Idaho and Nevada. Smaller increases in some larger states masked sizable numbers of newly poor children such as in California (221,000) and Florida (183,000). A major takeaway from Report Card 12 is that the economic crisis has been a recession about children. The most telling data confirming this is the Report’s look at how different vulnerable groups were affected. In 28 out of 31 European countries the poverty rate has increased more rapidly (or has decreased more slowly) for the young than for the elderly. Not surprisingly, youth employment has taken a huge hit across the developed world. The more frightening news has to do with “NEETs,” or, 15 to 24 year olds not in education, employment or training. NEET rates stayed the same or rose in 35 out of the 41 countries in the report. “Great Leap Backward” is a telling way to sum up the impact of the recession on children. This really hits hard when you read how many years of lost income progress many OECD countries have sustained. Between 2008 and 2012, Greek families lost the equivalent of 14 years of progress; Ireland, Luxembourg and Spain lost a full decade; and four other nations lost almost as much.

The abduction of more than 200 high school girls in northern Nigeria has touched a global nerve. The twitter hashtag #BringBackOurGirls has generated millions of posts. UNICEF and other agencies have issued special statements. Superpowers are offering to send in military aid. It’s not the first time a horrendous act of violence against children has moved the world. I am pretty sure it won’t be the last. These moments of global concern about violence affecting children are usually brief, yet sadly, they don’t often result in level-headed responses. The acts of violence that make the headlines often have to do with deeply rooted and longstanding social norms—cultural, political and economic—that make girls and boys around the world vulnerable to many forms of violence, including forced early marriage, as well as child trafficking and abuse of children in armed conflict. When violence stays in the headlines there is a risk that we can miss an opportunity to focus in on the systemic social drivers of it. Policies and programmes are sometimes abandoned or hastily changed. Social protection services are pressured to drop what they are doing and deliver immediate results. Millions of dollars may be thrown into hasty policy re-directions based on thin evidence of success. What can make a difference? Believe it or not, one of the most important tools in ending violence against children is better research that improves understanding of what drives these violent outbursts, as well as the hidden ones that go on day in and day out around the world. What? More research? This is a crisis. Grab a shovel, pitchfork and scythe. How on earth will research #BringBackOurGirls? UNICEF’s Office of Research – Innocenti is gearing up for a major four-year action research project in Italy, Peru, Vietnam and Zimbabwe, which aims to significantly increase understanding of what drives violence against children and how best to respond to it. A global team of top child protection researchers will analyze evidence on effective responses and rigorously measure their impact on children. The aim is to generate a substantial multi-country knowledge base to help build more effective interventions. In 2013 UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador Liam Neeson joined UNICEF in urging people to speak out when they witness or suspect violence against children. More information about the #ENDviolence initiative is available here. © UNICEF/NYHQ2013-0512/Toledano Violence against children is a constant which we still poorly understand.   It is pervasive: in the homes, neighborhoods, and schools where children are supposed to be safe. It is more often committed by the very people children ought to be able to turn to for protection. Growing evidence suggests 1 out of 4 children experience serious sexual, physical or emotional violence or abuse in their lifetimes. My gut feeling tells me it’s much higher, with most incidences going unreported. Some progress has been made on understanding violence against women, and there is much to learn from that in relation to children. However, too often theories about the dynamics of violence fail to take into account the extraordinary implications of age and its links with gender. Children grow, their capacities and vulnerabilities evolve and change, and, for example, what drives violence against a two year old girl may be quite different than that which affects a 14 year old boy, with different societal and individual consequences. Violence is nurtured by a culture of silence and the complex interplay of age-old assumptions on gender, age and authority. It is a social disease – and it happens in every country. Once we understand the underlying patterns of this virus, our policies and programmes are more likely to help stop it. Let’s unite and raise our voices in an effort to #BringBackOurGirls. But let’s also get to work on generating solid evidence on how to prevent and reduce the complicated phenomenon of human violence against the young and vulnerable, and in the process protect millions of children.

C4D, S4D and now ICT4D. The latest “4D” could represent one of the most important social and economic development trends in years. Communication technologies have long been seen as development “silver bullets.” First radio was going to boost productivity for rural farmers, then TV sets were supposed to replace teachers in remote classrooms, then computers were to become the great equalizers. Outsized expectations have almost always exceeded Information and Communications Technology (ICT) realities for development. But ICTs could finally be coming of age – due to the rapid spread of cell phones and internet – and their impact is reaching far beyond text message weather and commodity price reports for rural farmers. In a many ways digital technology and wireless communication networks are now over-shooting expectations and starting to deliver development dividends that generate their own forward momentum. Best of all, in many instances, end users in impoverished regions are having their say and formulating the framework of the latest generation of ICT for development: ICT4D. Things are moving so quickly that research and documentation can hardly keep up with the diffusion of ICT4D innovations. To help map and analyze these developments the UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti is releasing a new report called “Children, ICTs and Development: Capturing the potential, meeting the challenges”which polls 35 leading experts in the field and analyses major research on the use of ICTs to improve the situation of vulnerable children. The report could be the first effort to specifically study the relationship between ICT4D and efforts to improve the situation of children. UNICEF has recently launched a global innovation unit pioneering the use of these and other new technologies, and has dedicated its November 2014 State of the World’s Children report to the theme of “Innovation for Equity.” The evidence of positive impact is mounting. The case of Zambia’s U-reporters is inspiring. With UNICEF help young people are using a simple SMS application to engage with policy makers on burning issues. More than 25,000 youth across Zambia – almost half female – are using SMS to access confidential, quality HIV-STI services. Zambia’s U-Reporter network is focused on HIV prevention, but will soon expand to address other needs. In Uganda, similar technology is going even further. Through U Report, more than 200,000 young people are connecting, discussing Local staff printing a birth certificate at Mityana hospital in Uganda using technology called Mobile Vital Records System. ©UNICEF/Uganda/2013/Sibiloniand mapping issues from sanitation in schools to gender discrimination. The network’s most recent SMS polls have covered, child poverty, birth registration, child health days, women’s access to credit. Connected by SMS, this vast network is gathering hard evidence and generating data maps to pressure leaders for change. According to one report “Information collected from these channels will be used to build a real time ‘accountability chain.’” In China the “10m2 of Love” smartphone app is mapping a growing list of breastfeeding rooms in workplaces and public buildings which meet ILO standards. Across 60 cities the app is helping families navigate to the nearest breastfeeding space and encouraging Chinese employers to embrace Child Rights Business Principles in the work place. Woven into China’s popular social media networks, the app mobilizes crowd-sourced quality control, provides contact details for hundreds of trained breastfeeding peer counselors and galvanizes an increasingly passionate breastfeeding advocacy movement. Before the launch of this ICT campaign UNICEF had never partnered with volunteers in China! ©UNICEF/China/2013Despite the clear up-side, the development community still needs to exercise caution, as the new research shows the ICT4D experience for children also contains its share of challenges. The study shows that girls are still less likely to benefit than boys, and while rural access is expanding it is still well behind urban areas. Cost is also a major obstacle which could mean that “quick fix” ICT4D interventions have the potential to widen inequities. The necessity of rooting ICT4D strategies deeply in the local cultural context is highlighted. Watch this space because I will continue to devote much of this blog to the impact of new interactive communication technologies on child rights. (Blogger note: This is my first blog post since joining the UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti team. Our new study “Children, ICTs and Development: Capturing the potential, meeting the challenges,” has been jointly produced with the ICT4D Centre at Royal Holloway, University of London and Jigsaw Consult. It will be launched at the “Digitally Connected symposium on children, youth and digital media” hosted by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society and UNICEF on April 28-30, 2014 at Harvard University.) C4D - Communication for Development; S4D - Sport for Development; ICT4D - Information & Communication Technology for Development