Supporting the Measurement and Enhancement of African Children's Rights and Well-being in Nutrition, Healthcare and Education Through a Gender Lens, 2019-2020

Zhang, Mary and Gordon, David and Grieve, Tigist (2021). Supporting the Measurement and Enhancement of African Children's Rights and Well-being in Nutrition, Healthcare and Education Through a Gender Lens, 2019-2020. [Data Collection]. Colchester, Essex: UK Data Service. 10.5255/UKDA-SN-855190

The governments of the World have agreed to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The first five goals are no poverty, zero hunger, good health and well-being, quality education and gender equality. The African Child Policy Forum (ACPF) is the leading independent, not-for-profit, Pan-African organisation, specialising in helping African governments to improve their policies and practices to meet the SDGs for children. This project builds upon a long-term partnership between the ACPF and the University of Bristol to make better use of available data to provide policymakers with the high-quality evidence they need to help meet the first five SDGs.

Agenda 2063 is Africa's blueprint and master plan for transforming Africa into the global powerhouse of the future. It is the continent's strategic framework that aims to deliver on its goal for inclusive and sustainable development. This ambitious goal cannot be achieved without improvements in the lives of African Children. However, approximately 27 million African children suffer from stunting (low height for age), 16 million are underweight (low weight for age) and 8 million suffer from wasting (low weight for height). In 2016, only two-thirds of children in Africa had been vaccinated against diphtheria, tetanus and other serious childhood diseases. Similarly, about 7 million children in Eastern and Southern Africa and 8 million in West and Central Africa are likely to receive no pre-primary education in 2030 given the current slow rates of improvement (UNICEF 2018). The combination of poverty and inadequate nutrition, healthcare and education are amongst the most intractable development challenges faced by most countries in Africa (ACPF 2018).

Gender discrimination is also a significant problem in Africa, and there remain many social, economic and cultural factors contributing to the disempowerment and discriminatory practices that disadvantage women and girls. There is a pressing need for systematic assessments on the nature and extent of gender discrimination in nutrition, healthcare and education in Africa over the past decade (2008-2018).

This project will analyse relevant data about children's lives and circumstances using state-of-the-art quantitative and qualitative methods to explore 'what' changes there have been in child nutrition, healthcare and education during the past ten years in Africa, 'when' these changes are related to gender disparities and the availability and quality of child protection policies and services in each country, and 'where' children at sub-national level are at the greatest risk of being left behind.

Outputs from this project were published by ACPF in their flagship report <The African Report on Child Well-being 2020: How Friendly are African Governments towards the Girl Child?>

Data description (abstract)

This project involves the analysis of secondary policy and household survey macro- and micro-data that are relevant to African governments’ fulfilment of children’s rights and well-being in nutrition, healthcare and education, with a focus on gender equality. It includes national and sub-national demographic, economic and social variables obtained from various data resources. Details can be found via The African Report on Child Wellbeing 2020 (https://www.africanchild.report/index.php/home).

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