A new report from the international NGO World Vision written in collaboration with Ernst & Young Australia entitled “Putting Children First for Sustainable Development” has revealed that just 5% of annual Official Development Assistance (ODA) is specifically targeted to helping children despite children constituting 46% of the populations of aid-receiving countries.
Fig.1. Multilateral and bilateral child-related ODA
Source: Putting Children First for Sustainable Development
The report also notes that this comes in the midst of a devastating crisis for children where decades of progress on survival, education, and nutrition have been stalled or even reversed. Furthermore, the report highlights that more than 1 billion children on the planet currently have limited access to basic needs such as shelter, food, and water.
“Our report shows that development aid delivers enormous value for the world’s most vulnerable children, but it also reveals that only 5% of ODA is directly targeting children. That’s why I’m challenging the next UK government to increase their target [of child-related aid] to 10% of ODA. I’m also requesting that the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office appoint a Special Envoy for Children to put children’s rights at the heart of policy decisions,” said Fola Kamolafe, the CEO of World Vision UK.
Making the case for greater investments in children
The unique methodology developed by Ernst & Young for the report examined ODA flows between 2017-2021 in order to identify child-related investments. It reveals that a “total social value” of $10 is generated for every dollar’s worth of ODA targeted at children. The total social value is calculated from putting an economic price tag on better health and increased educational opportunities for children along with “further indirect benefits” such as increased knowledge and awareness in the broader community.
Fig.2. Impacts of critical global challenges on children
Source: Putting Children First for Sustainable Development
Using their unique methodology, the authors of the report are thus calling on donors, multilateral institutions, and other providers of ODA to consider increasing aid targeted at children as an economically sound return on investment, saying that “investing in children is a way to maximize the benefit for donors” and their ODA strategy.
A new framework for accelerating progress
According to the World Vision report, their new methodology and research has identified a framework that can be used to create integrated interventions that will both accelerate progress in addressing problems that children face as well as have a cumulative effect on achieving a range of SDG (Sustainable Development Goals) targets.
The authors of the report do warn that this framework is context-specific, but they believe that it can help donors better focus on delivering essential services to children such as addressing learning deficits, decreasing morbidity, improving nutrition, and delivering better physical safety and mental health for young people.
The authors further state that both decision-making and funding must increasingly move under the aegis of local actors and communities because they are the ones who know best how to implement solutions to their development challenges. The report also warns that this shift will require redressing power imbalances and deeply rooted cultural practices and traditions. However, by investing in children, this can boost positive structural changes in these societies to create more inclusive communities with empowered local organizations that can more successfully engage with the state in order to shape policy change and achieve greater accountability.
