Governments Must Ease Pressure on Families to Stop Children Slipping Through the Cracks
Dereje Wordofa
Opinion by Dereje Wordofa (innsbruck, austria)
Inter Press Service
INNSBRUCK, Austria, Nov 18 (IPS) - From the cost-of-living crisis to the impacts of war, cuts to social protection and even climate change, families worldwide are facing a combination of pressures that test their capacity to cope and care for children.
Dereje WordofaAs a result, millions of children and young adults are at risk of losing vital and formative family bonds, care and protection, which can cause lasting and even intergenerational harm.
Globally, an estimated 220 million children – one in 10 – already live without parental care or are at risk of losing it. In Africa alone, 35 million children were believed to be living without parental care in 2020. These grim realities show widespread and large-scale child suffering despite the 2030 global promise to end poverty, leaving no one behind.
To protect the welfare and rights of children and their futures, governments must urgently ease pressures on families by addressing the root causes of family breakdowns.
While there is no single cause of family separation, new research shows that a combination of risk factors such as intergenerational violence, social exclusion, poverty and inadequate social protection services can contribute to family breakdowns.
Many of these drivers can be better managed and minimised with the right support services in place, allowing families to cope with challenging circumstances and minimising the risk of child-family separation.
Enhancing preventative child protection, expanding access to inclusive family support and adopting a people-centred approach to care can help governments and international agencies to achieve this.
Firstly, it is vital to enhance preventative child protection measures to ensure the wellbeing of all children, especially those already vulnerable to violence and neglect.
Children can face risks of exposure to violence such as gender-based and domestic violence within their family structures. Taking preventative measures, such as investing in parenting and anti-violence programmes, can enhance safety in homes and communities for children and families.
These initiatives must focus on strengthening rights-based child protection systems to recognize and prevent violence which often results in child-family separation. For example, implementing public awareness initiatives on conflict management and child safety would help empower caregivers to protect children in the home and beyond.
Outside of their homes, children can also face violence in conflicts such as wars, which also significantly threaten safety and leave children at risk of separation from their families.
Between 2005 and 2022, more than 300,000 violations against children living in conflict were verified by the United Nations, with documented reports of children facing atrocious acts of violence such as abduction, recruitment by armed groups, sexual assault and even death.
In such cases where children have fallen victim to violence, governments must go a step further to ensure access to services such as shelter, legal, medical and financial assistance for children and families affected.
Secondly, to reduce family separation, it is important to expand access to inclusive social protection programs, especially for economically disadvantaged families.
Poverty significantly increases the chances of children being placed in alternative care. Related factors such as unemployment, lack of access to inclusive healthcare and education, housing insecurities and much more, are disruptive to family life.
In such situations, attempts to access basic services, labour migration or even incarceration due to crime as a resort for survival often lead to the splitting of children from their core families.
To avoid this, public policy, national budgets and political commitment are essential to deliver universal access to adequate social protection services. These include education, health and income safety nets, and also better inclusion, particularly through addressing gender, disability, and age-related inequalities.
Lastly, it is important to adopt a people-centred approach to care and protection. Improving evidence-driven care system design and delivery while prioritising safe and meaningful participation of children and families in these systems can make a difference.
For example, equipping care professionals and practitioners with the skills, knowledge and resources that they need in order to understand children and families facing challenges in different contexts can effectively deliver better results in keeping families together.
This can be done by ensuring that frontline workers are up to date with policies relating to issues that affect families and that they are able to deliver care and protection in a way that is accessible and meaningful to those targeted.
For example, delivering care to families that are in remote areas may look completely different to those in urban areas, these diverse contexts should be considered and accounted for.
Growing up without family bonds and care can put children at risk of physical, mental and social harm, reinforcing vulnerabilities that in turn perpetuate family breakdowns.
Scaling up investments in programmes that address the root causes of family separation is vital and great value for money to tackle the number of children separated from their families unnecessarily and ensure a safe, secure future for every one of them.
Dr. Dereje Wordofa, President, SOS Children's Villages International