Carola Eyber & Maggie Brown (INTRAC) for Coalition Family for EveryChild

1. Developing indicators for monitoring the context & policy situation for children without parental care (2012) Carola Eyber & Maggie Brown (INTRAC) for Coalition Family for EveryChild

2. Sections of this presentation: • Background & purpose of the report • Methodology: Process of identifying indicators & data collection • Key findings (brief) • Key challenges: Methodological & context/policy related

3. Section 1: Background & purpose of the report

4. Background In 2011 EveryChild together with partner organisations formed an international coalition Family for EveryChild. This Coalition is to transform into an Alliance in 2014 which will take on the advocacy role for children without parental care (CWPC). Aims of the Coalition: to mobilise knowledge, skills and resources so that more children without parental care, or at risk of losing parental care, can grow up in caring families or in appropriate alternative care. EveryChild as a member of this Coalition commissioned a context & policy study which would allow the Coalition and future Alliance to assess and monitor its progress and achievements in future.

5. Purpose of the Context & Policy Analysis report 1) To measure trends and progress in relation to outcomes and impacts for and with children over time 2) To inform advocacy targets such as: • The situation on children under 3 in institutions • The major gaps and issues in relation to compliance with the UN Guidelines for all groups of CWPC • To contribute to debates on the post MDG agenda 3) To provide comparative information across Coalition Member countries that will help with defining country and regional level priority issues 4) To identify data gaps at national level and to review national data systems.

6. Countries for which baseline indicators were collected • Egypt • Ethiopia • South Africa • Brazil • Mexico • Guyana • India • Russian Federation • Tajikistan • Indonesia

7. Context & policy situation in relation to: Seven groups of children without parental/adequate care: • Children in institutions • Children in foster care • Children in kinship care • Children who are adopted • Children in detention • Children living on streets • Children living with exploitative employers + policies for preventing separation

8. Section 2: Methodology: Process of identifying indicators & data collection

9. Process of identifying indicators • Identified those categories of children for which established indicators existed: Better Care Network indicators for Formal Care and on the Juvenile Justice Indicators (UNICEF) • Searched guidelines and policy documents for potential indicators and compiled these for each category • Focused here predominantly on first 3 categories & indicators of risk of separation • Consulted Coalition members on the proposed indicators and removed/added as per suggestions Decided to focus on: • country context indicators • policy indicators and • quantitative impact indicators

10. Country context indicators 1) Poverty data by Coalition member country: • Poverty (% of population living on less than $2,- a day) • Under 5 mortality rate • Net migration rate • Child labour 2) Violence, abuse & neglect indicators by Coalition member country: • Acceptance of violence against children, • Justification of wife beating • Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting

11. 3) Disability: • Under 5s underweight (moderate and severe) • % pregnant women who attend 4 ante natal appointments • % skilled attendant at birth • % fully immunized against polio (as example of prevention by vaccination) • % exclusively breastfed (0-6 months) • % Vitamin A supplement coverage rate 4) HIV/AIDS and maternal mortality • Number people living with HIV (UNAIDS) • Women aged 15 and over living with HIV (UNAIDS) • % adult prevalence of HIV aged 15-49 years (UNICEF/ UNAIDS) • % of eligible adults and children currently receiving ART (UNAIDS • % known to be on ART treatment 12 months after initiating treatment (UNAIDS) • Maternal mortality per 100,000 live births (UNICEF)

12. 5) Access to good quality education • Pre-primary access (gross enrolment). • Net attendance rate for enrolled children at primary school • Survival rate to last primary grade (survey data) 6)Armed conflict and natural disasters • Numbers of population affected by disasters in previous year • Internally displaced population in previous year • Number of children under 18 years displaced or refugees within the country

13. 7) Adolescent births, overcrowding and orphanhood • Adolescent birth rate which is defined as the number of births per 100,000 girls aged 15-19 • The percentage of households with 8 or more members indicating possible overcrowding • Number of orphans due to all causes • The percentage of all children who are orphaned or one or both parents

14. Impact indicators 1) Children living without parents in household DHS surveys provide information: • The percentage of children living without either parent in the household • The percentage of children not living with either parent by age group

15. Impact indicators 2) Children in residential care

17. 3) Children in alternative formal care

19. 4) Children in informal kinship care

20. Policy & legislation indicators on preventing separation • Policies on alternative care prioritise support for parents and extended families (over institutional care or foster care) • Provision of family strengthening services (such as parenting skills, pre-school care, substance abuse treatment, conflict resolution). • Provision for child sensitive social protection (such as predictable social transfers and programmes to ensure access to essential services) • National disaster preparedness policies include reference to the importance of preventing family separation and providing alternative family based care for children without parental care.

21. Policy & legislation indicators on preventing separation ctd. • National Plans of Action for Orphans and Vulnerable Children should include reference to alternative care and the importance of family based care. • Training and capacity building of social work professionals and para professionals in order to fulfil core functions of child protection, support to carers, gatekeeping, care planning and service management. • Provision for the diversion of juveniles from court procedures and from detention, as well as provision for the after care of juveniles released from detention.

22. On the quality of alternative care of children • Strategies for developing alternatives to large scale institutions • The development of a wide range of care options for CWPC and a specific policy that no under 3s • should be in residential care • Orientation on care planning and standards for the regular review of care • Establish systems for the registration and regulation of foster carers at district and national levels

23. On the quality of alternative care of children ctd. • Establish systems for the registration/ regulation of all residential institutions and group homes • Acknowledge the importance of child participation in decisions regarding care • Make explicit reference to the importance of providing high quality care for children with disabilities. • Policies and standards on domestic adoption and ratification of the Hague Convention on international adoption.

24. Process of data collection: • Identifying trustworthy & standardised data sources • Accessing DHS data • Undertook some calculation of DHS data (potential is there for this to be done for some of the variables/indicators) • Key actors in-country as sources of data, including Coalition members • Investigate relationship between policy, legislation & monitoring of implementation

25. Sources of information Where possible one single source of information has been used: • UNICEF MICS country profiles: http://www.childinfo.org/mics.html • UNICEF member country reports on specific issues (various websites) • Periodic reports to the Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC Report): http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/crc/ • DHS data: (usually in the form of Country reports : http://www.measuredhs.com/Data/ • National census data (various websites) • Child Rights Information Network: http://www.crin.org/ • Better Care Network: http://www.crin.org/bcn/ • Country-specific Ministries on child, youth, welfare, development, women, health, education (various websites) • UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre: http://www.unicef-irc.org/ • TransMonEE for Central & Eastern Europe: http://www.transmonee.org/

26. Information that was difficult to find: • Child participation in decision-making • Children who are orphans in formal care, CHH etc. • Violence & abuse of children • Children under 3 in residential care • Quality of care • Contact with parents • Children living with exploitative employers

27. Section 3: Key findings

28. Key findings • Reasons for children losing parental care are complex, context specific and interactive • Rates of children living in institutions: no linear relationship with poverty statistics • Disability appears to be a much more significant factor in losing parental care, especially to institutions, in some countries than others. • The country that has the highest percentage of children living without both parents, South Africa at 23%, also has an extensive system of grants to foster carers, the majority of whom are relatives. • In relation to children under five years in institutions, rates are especially high in Brazil, Egypt and Mexico, all of which feature within the groups of countries with the lowest overall rates of children in institutions.

29. Key findings ctd. • Kinship care was by far the highest for children living away from parents (greatest proportion with grandparents). In Ethiopia, 19% of all households include at least one child with no parent present. • The percentage of children in kinship care increases with age band in all countries but the total varies considerably between societies. In Tajikistan only 3% of 15-17 year olds were living without either parent and of these 11.5% had been orphaned of one or both parents. By comparison, 29.4% of children aged 12-17 in South Africa were living without either parent and, of these, only 4.6% were orphaned of both parents. • The development of policy and the implementation of foster care systems has been unequal across different regions and countries.

30. Key findings ctd. • Child headed households:South Africa &Guyana had the highest number. Census data shows that 88% of children in CHH are aged 15 years or over and 44% of CHH in South Africa consist of only one child • The Russian Federation followed by Guyana had the highest rates of children in detention. • Children living on the streets: statistics are very weak -only Brazil had conducted a census.ForIndia and Brazil, estimates of children actually sleeping on the streets are much lower than those working on the streets. • For children with exploitative employers, data is extremely sparse. • Policies to prevent children losing parental care:the strongest policy frameworks are in Brazil, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia and Guyana - have recently passed new legislation or strong guidelines

31. Key findings ctd. • Social protection to prevent separation through poverty, the strongest are Brazil (Bolsa Família), Indonesia (Family Hope), Mexico (Oportunidades), the Russian Federation (Children of Russia), South Africa (Child Support Grants and Care Dependency Grants). • In most countries no clear statement about prioritising family care over institutions: Guidelines exist for care planning and standards in seven out of ten countries and systems for the registration of foster carers were found in all countries. Guidelines and systems were found for the registration of residential institutions in all but one country (Egypt) but in some countries they are not working effectively and many unregistered institutions continue to function (South Africa, Mexico).

32. Section 4: Key Challenges

33. Gaps in the data & information system • Data not collected: • Throughput statistics on children in formal care (except Russian Fed & Tajikistan) • Data on different types of residential care • Data on children leaving formal care for a family placement • Data on prevalence of disability by age & gender & relationship to separation (except Russian Fed, Brazil & Tajikistan)

34. 2) Data not analysed: • DHS data on the relationship of children living without parents to the head of household: this is collected but not included in the analysis in reports • DHS data could provide analysis on children living with kin as head of household and basic welfare data (access to school, last class achieved etc.). • DHS data could also provide information on child headed households if these indicators were included at the time of analysis; the data is collected.

35. Key methodological challenges • It was not possible to analyse the effect of universal social protection systems on the loss of parental care as those countries with the most effective systems, Brazil and Mexico, did not have statistics on children living without both parents. However, this would be interesting to review through census statistics. • Kinship care: the exact breakdown of relationship to the head of household and the total percentage of households was not available for all countries. This may be data that could be relatively easy to obtain from DHS surveys if it was included as an indicator from the beginning. • Data at times was weak and incomplete: entry into foster care; contact with birth families etc.

36. Key policy challenges • Need broad agreement on core indicators for children without adequate care amongst key actors • Formal care indicators need to include children under 3 • Collecting high quality data for policy making requires strong technical capacity and political will by the State to establish systems for data collection and collation through government departments or national statistics offices • Although various household surveys are already undertaken and data collected that could provide information on children in kinship care, in informal non-relative foster care and in child headed households, most are not currently analysed against those variables. • Census systems could also provide that data if those indicators were included in the design stage of the census

37. Key challenges ctd. • Technical capacity in qualitative research and especially the political will to engage children systematically in research is present. • To ensure that data is used for policymaking and strategies, national bodies such as national councils for children’s rights, that typically bring different government ministers together with civil society representatives, need to demand and analyse the data for policy making. • National data systems on CWPC (like India & Brazil) need to be developed

38. Thank you