There is growing interest in engaging not only mothers but also fathers in parenting programs to improve nurturing care, psychosocial support, and early childhood development. However, few studies have explored how mothers perceive and benefit from participating in parenting interventions alongside their partners. This study explored mothers’ experiences during the pilot implementation of Familia Bora , a couples-based parenting program delivered in six communities in Mwanza, Tanzania (July-November 2024). In-depth interviews were conducted with mothers at baseline, midline, and endline using both random and purposive sampling. A total of 22 mothers participated in endline interviews, of whom 15 (68%) were purposively re-interviewed from the baseline sample to enable longitudinal qualitative analysis of perceived changes over time. Interviews explored mothers’ perceptions of changes in parenting practices, gender roles and attitudes, couples’ relationships, maternal mental health, and complementary feeding practices. Mothers commonly reported improvements across all domains. They described increased use of responsive caregiving and early learning activities, reduced harsh discipline, and improved nutrition knowledge and child feeding practices. Mothers also highlighted greater father involvement in childcare and more supportive couples’ relationship dynamics, which they perceived as reducing their caregiving burden and supporting their mental health. Overall, engaging fathers through couples-based parenting interventions may catalyze shifts within households that benefit mothers through improved caregiving practices, stronger partner relationships, and more nurturing family environments. These findings highlight the potential of father-inclusive parenting programs to support maternal, child, and family well-being.
Valencia J. Lambert, Alina Bhojani, Gabriel Sangarara et al.
Child trafficking is increasingly mediated through social media, artificial intelligence (AI) and other digital technologies, creating new opportunities for exploitation while strengthening digital prevention and protection. This study examines how digital platforms both facilitate and disrupt technology-enabled child trafficking in Kenya through a digital ethnography that combines social media observations, stakeholder interviews, focus group discussions and analysis of online anti-trafficking discourse. Guided by the Routine Activity and Situational Prevention (RASP) framework, the study investigates how digital opportunity structures shape offender behavior, target vulnerability and distributed digital guardianship. Findings show that traffickers exploit encrypted messaging, algorithmic recommendation systems, livestreaming, closed online communities and digital payment technologies to recruit, groom, coordinate and exploit children while reducing the perceived risk of detection. At the same time, government agencies, law enforcement, civil society organizations, technology companies and community actors employ artificial intelligence, digital evidence preservation, coordinated reporting systems, cross-sector partnerships and the Child Protection Information Management System (CPIMS) to strengthen detection, reporting, victim protection and institutional coordination. The study further demonstrates that anti-child trafficking communication is most effective when it transforms awareness into recognizable risk patterns, actionable reporting pathways, evidence preservation and coordinated institutional responses. The findings extend the RASP framework by conceptualizing the 5 P dimensions (Prevention, Protection, Policy, Prosecution and Partnership) as communication dimensions that operationalize digital guardianship within technology-enabled environments. The study contributes to digital criminology, communication, child protection, platform governance and technology-enabled crime prevention, particularly in the Global South.
Each day, tens of thousands of girls worldwide are married while still children, often before they may be physically and emotionally ready to become wives and mothers. Child marriage, defined as marriage or a union taking place before the age of 18, endangers the life trajectories of these girls in numerous ways. Child brides are at greater risk of experiencing a range of poor health outcomes, having children at younger ages, having more children over their lifetimes, dropping out of school, earning less over their lifetimes and living in poverty than their peers who marry at later ages. Child brides may also be more likely to experience intimate partner violence, have restricted physical mobility, and limited decision-making ability. Most fundamentally, thesegirls may be disempowered in ways that deprive them of their basic rights to health, education, equality, nondiscrimination, and to live free from violence and exploitation, which continue to affect them into adulthood. These dynamics affect not only the girls themselves, but their children, households, communities and societies, limiting their ability to reach their full social and economic potential. While child marriage is widely considered a human rights issue closely connected to gender inequality, the significance of the practice’s impacts at both the individual and societal levels suggests that ending child marriage may play an important role in alleviating poverty and in promoting economic development. Ending child marriage can improve health at the individual and population levels, increase productivity and enhance the opportunity to realize the gains in a country’s economic growth that can result from declining birth rates and a shifting population age structure, commonly referred to as the ‘demographic dividend.’ To date, however,there has been relatively little in the way of rigorous assessment of the economic impacts of child marriage or how much child marriage may “cost” countries and societies. To address this challenge, the International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) and the World Bank collaborated on an extensive and innovative research project to assess the impacts of child marriage on arange of development outcomes, and to understand the economic costs associated with these impacts across countries. By establishing the effects that child marriage has on economic outcomes, the research project aimed to catalyze more effective and evidence-based action to prevent it. This brief describes research undertaken for Ethiopia to better assess the impacts of child marriage on a range of development outcomes and the costs associated with these impacts. (World)
The international community is increasingly aware of the negative impacts of child marriage on a wide range of development outcomes. Ending child marriage is now part of the Sustainable Development Goals. Yet investments to end the practice remain limited across the globe. Ethiopia recently adopted a strategy to end child marriage, and some of the projects being implemented in the country should contribute to reduce the practice child marriage. Still, more could be done. In order to inspire greater commitments towards ending child marriage, this study demonstrates the negative impacts of the practice and their associated economic costs. The study looks at five domains of impacts: (i) fertility and population growth; (ii) health, nutrition, and violence; (iii) educational attainment and learning; (iv) labor force participation and earnings; and (v) participation, decision-making, and investments. Economic costs are estimated for several of theimpacts. Overall, the costs are high. They suggest that investing to end child marriage is not only the right thing to do, but also makes sense economically. (World)
This study qualitatively explores early stimulation practices in Katavi region, Tanzania. It also quantitatively investigates the links between these early stimulation practices and development of children 0-3 years of age in the Katavi region. A comparative qualitative case study was carried out in Zanzibar region and findings have been presented throughout discussion section of this report, in parallel to the case of Katavi. Through this work the research team has developed a robust package of early childhood development research tools that have been carefully adapted and tested for use in Tanzania. The study uses and validates the combined use of tools to measure children's development (the CREDI tool) and the home environment (the HOME tool) for the first time in Tanzania. This package includes a complete survey including culturally-adapted, Kiswahili versions of the CREDI and HOME tools plus a caregiver information form that have all been digitized for data collection using electronic tablets. There is an accompanying video that guides users through the digitized version of the tool. The package also includes a four-day training guide with power points that may be used to prepare enumerators to collect the survey data. The adapted versions of these tools are free to users and easily accessible for others who wish to explore early stimulation and child development in Tanzania. (Tanzania)
The objective of the Towards Zero Stunting in Djibouti Project is to reduce stunting among children under five in Djibouti. There are four components to the project, the first component being high-impact health and nutrition services to reduce stunting. This component focuses on the delivery of services and interventions that address stunting at both the facility and community levels. This component includes two subcomponents: strengthening of health and nutrition services at the facility level; prevention and management of stunting and wasting at the community level. The second component is the strengthening multi-sectoral interventions for stunting reduction. This component will focus on creating an enabling environment for strengthening multi-sectoral interventions that are critical for reduction of stunting. This component includes three subcomponents: using multi-sectoral platforms for the prevention and management of stunting; addressing stunting in relevant policies and strategies; and multi-sectoral capacity building. The third component is the strengthening coordination, project management and monitoring and evaluation. This component includes two subcomponents: institutional strengthening for coordination, project management and M&E, and strengthening the use of information systems for enhanced M&E capacity. Finally, the fourth component is the contingent emergency response component. (Djibouti)
Uganda needs to allocate more resources to the social sectors (education, health and social protection) and to productivity-enhancing policies in the agriculture sector. Higher levels of investment in education, social protection, health (complemented by investments to increase access to water and sanitation services), and agriculture, are required for Uganda to attain two of its medium-term policy objectives: reducing poverty and inequality, and promoting economic growth in Uganda. While education has been a major factor in reducing poverty and inequality in the past, current levels of funding are inadequate. Education also helps households to smooth adverse shocks, making them less vulnerable to factors outside the control of households and individuals. Additional investment is needed to address the recent decline in primary enrollment rates and increase the quality of education at this level. Also, improving the availability and affordability of secondary education, especially in rural areas, is essential the raise the stubbornly low secondary enrollment rates. Addressing the high levels of under-five mortality, child stunting and teenage pregnancy requires the GoU to improve the provision of health care services to women and children. This in turn requires devoting more resources to the delivery of these services. Given the multi-faceted nature of these issues, complementary efforts in other sectors are also required, particularly through education programs and investments in sanitation and hygiene facilities. Programs aimed at increasing the agricultural productivity of smallholder farmers should have sufficient funding in the budget. The GoU should promote programs that improve the quality of inputs in local markets through certification programs and should increase the availability of extension services and credit to smallholder farmers. (Uganda)
The development objective of Social and Economic Inclusion Project for Kenya is to enhance access of poor and vulnerable to integrated social and economic inclusion as well as shock-responsive social protection. some of the negative impacts include: (i) fragile and hazardous location; (ii) lack of access to resources and services; (iii) disintegration of social patterns; (iv) disinheritance of land and other livelihood related resources; (v) exclusion from the political and socioeconomic activities of the country; (vi) lack of access to information and knowledge; (vii) lack of public awareness; and (viii) limited access to political power and representation. Some of the mitigation measures include: (i) limited access to political power and representation; (ii) training and civic education of the recruited VMG groups should be undertaken to enhance understanding of their rights and entitlements; (iii) women and youth groups recruited and trained for economic inclusion activities should be disclosed and displayed at the Assistant Chief’s office; and (iv) ensure that barriers to inclusion are addressed for eligible population, including minority groups. (Kenya)
The development objective of Social and Economic Inclusion Project for Kenya is to enhance access of poor and vulnerable to integrated social and economic inclusion as well as shock-responsive social protection. Some of the negative impacts include: i) increased tension between beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries; ii) over-reliance on cash transfers and failure to engage in livelihood activities that build resilience to climate change; iii) absence of broad community support; iv) inadequate engagement in decision-making processes; v) poor targeting of beneficiaries and exclusion; vi) broken promises and unmet expectations of benefits; vii) disruption to amenities and lifestyle; viii) loss of livelihood; ix) violation of human rights; x) social dislocation; Some of the mitigation measures include: (i) increased access to self-employment opportunities through investments; (ii) development of entrepreneurial skills for setting up businesses but also to access devolved funds (UWEZO, Youth and Women Funds); (iii) skills development in leadership, managing groups and civic education, and (iv) training on personal and community development; (v) Government has committed to universal NHIF coverage, but KSEIP would only target existing National Safety Net Program (NSNP) beneficiaries; (vi) ensure proper targeting so that multiple HHs are not considered as one; (vii) Economic inclusion interventions would also include some non-NSNP beneficiaries; (viii) nutrition counseling to include guidance on nutritional food and importance of parents providing their children with nutritional food; (ix) economic inclusion interventions would also include some non-NSNP beneficiaries; (x) beneficiary outreach strategy, enhancing the understanding of communities on the need for inclusion of all VMGs; (xi) create better awareness among beneficiaries that the CT programs are resilience building and should not be seen as humanitarian assistance; (xii) Involve both majority and minority groups in project design, planning and implementation; (Kenya)
The development objective of Protection of Essential Health Services Project is to increase the utilization and quality of an essential package of health services in South Sudan, with a particular focus on the former states of Upper Nile and Jonglei. Some of the negative impacts include: (i) inequitable availability and access to service delivery in areas that are not highly vulnerable; (ii) poor hygiene, water and sanitation in health facilities negatively impacts safe delivery of health care services; (iii) Implementing partners (IPs) are not prepared nor equipped to respond to emergencies, including disease outbreaks; (iv) ghost workers and ghost health facilities included in the project fraudulently consuming budgetary resources through inflated staffing and facility costs; (v) expired and damaged drugs negatively affecting communities in the areas where the project is implemented; (vi) inequitable availability and access to service delivery in areas that are not highly vulnerable; and (vii) shortage of suitably qualified staff or presence of lowly skilled medical staff. Some of the mitigation measures include: (i) mapping of functional health facilities and selection of those to be supported, considering, local administrative boundaries, government and non-government (IO) controlled areas, population size, cultural characteristics of the population, and conflict dynamics; (ii) develop waste management plans for each health facility; (iii) train IPs in emergency preparedness and response, including infectious disease surveillance and response (IDSR); (iv) physical verification and mapping of health facilities by community mobilizers as well as an auditing firm; (v) conduct a diagnostic assessment to assess how the supply chain can be improved to ensure adequate delivery to health facilities located in Sudanese People’s Liberation Army in Opposition (SPLA-IO) areas as well as other hard-to-reach areas; (vi) strengthen community engagement and dialogue to reduce targeting of health institutions when conflict occurs; and (vii) United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) will continue to work closely with United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) and Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) to utilize their channels for lobbying for access in conflict areas to allow programmatic assessments and interventions, monitoring and vital distribution of life saving drugs by UNICEF and its partner’ access. (South Sudan)
