FORUM ON INVESTING IN YOUNG CHILDREN GLOBALLY OVERVIEW1,2
The Forum on Investing in Young Children Globally, which has now launched, went through a yearlong planning process with initial planning grants by the Bernard van Leer Foundation and the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. The first planning meeting took place in March 2013 and the second one in June 2013. Out of those two meetings and discussions with multiple leaders in the field came the vision, objectives, and goals for the Forum on Investing in Young Children Globally.
The Board on Children, Youth, and Families of the Institute of Medicine (IOM) and the National Research Council (NRC), in collaboration with the IOM Board on Global Health launched the Forum on Investing in Young Children Globally in January 2014. At this meeting the participants agreed to focus on creating and sustaining, over 3 years, an evidence-driven community of stakeholders across northern and south-
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1 The planning committee’s role was limited to planning the workshop. The workshop summary has been prepared by the rapporteurs (with the assistance of Charlee Alexander, Pamella Atayi, Rachael Clark, and Sarah Tracey) as a factual account of what occurred at the workshop. Statements, recommendations, and opinions expressed are those of individual presenters and participants and are not necessarily endorsed or verified by the IOM. They should not be construed as reflecting any group consensus.
2 This section summarizes information presented by Zulfiqar Bhutta, Co-Director, SickKids Centre for Global Child Health, Toronto, and Founding Director, Center of Excellence for Women and Child Health, Aga Khan University, Karachi, Pakistan.
ern countries that aims to explore existing, new, and innovative science and research from around the world and translate this evidence into sound and strategic investments in policies and practices that will make a difference in the lives of children and their caregivers. Forum activities will highlight the science and economics of integrated investments in young children living in low-resourced regions of the world across the areas of health, nutrition, education, and social protection. As a result the forum will explore a holistic view of children and caregivers by integrating analyses and disciplines that span from neurons to neighborhoods and discuss the science from the microbiome to culture. Moreover, the forum will support an integrative vision to strengthen human capital. This work will be done through the forum and will engage in a series of stakeholder consultative sessions or public workshops, each focusing on specific aspects of science integration, bridging equity gaps, and implementing and scaling evidence-informed efforts.
A set of forum goals includes supporting the development of integrated science on children’s health, nutrition, education, and social protection and working with policy makers, practitioners, and researchers to raise awareness of integrated approaches to improve the lives of children and their caregivers. Forum objectives to meet these goals are expected:
- To shape a global vision of healthy child development across cultures and contexts, extending from preconception through at least age 8, and across current silo areas of health, nutrition, education, and social protection.
- To identify opportunities for intersectoral coordination among researchers, policy makers, implementers, practitioners, and advocates to improve quality practices in public and private settings and bring these practices to scale, in the context of the economics of strategic, integrated investing in young children.
- To inform ongoing conversations and activities of groups working on issues related to young children globally such as the sustainable development goals and indicators being developed.
- To identify current models of program and policy financing across health, education, nutrition, and social protection, within the framework of reproductive, maternal, newborn, and child health that aim to improve children’s developmental potential. This information could be used to illuminate opportunities for new financing structures and forms of investments that may be more effective in improving child outcomes and potentially drive economic development.
A central element in the forum’s activities is its workshops; the forum has planned a series of workshops over its 3-year tenure.3 These workshops will be held around the world and will address a range of topics, including investments in young children, financing investments in children and their caregivers, scaling preventive intervention programs for young children, platforms for integrated investments, family and community investments in children, and investing in children affected by conflict. On April 17–18, 2014, the forum conducted its first workshop focusing on investments in young children and the cost of inaction. A complete statement of task for this workshop is shown in Box 1-1.
This report summarizes the workshop presentations and discussions. The planning committee’s role was limited to planning the workshop, and the workshop summary has been prepared by the workshop rapporteurs as a factual summary of what occurred at the workshop. Statements, recommendations, and opinions expressed are those of individual presenters and participants, and are not necessarily endorsed or verified by the IOM and the NRC, and they should not be construed as reflecting any group consensus.
While acknowledging the importance of current research in early childhood development, several workshop participants argued for an increased need to translate that knowledge into actions that policy makers around the world could use to develop and optimize early childhood programs and investments. Individual suggestions to encourage that translation included:
- Shifting the early childhood development community’s core message to thriving, not merely surviving;
- A focus on prevention of poor child development outcomes;
- The use of community-based health workers to support and educate caregivers in supporting children’s developmental potential;
- Interventions and supports for young children, including cash transfer programs, early investment in education from early childhood into primary school, and early investment in nutrition and environmental enrichment;
- Additional delivery platforms to address inequities experienced by children; and
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3 More information about the forum and its activities, including future workshops, can be found online at http://www.iom.edu/Activities/Children/InvestingYoungChildrenGlobally.
- Integration across different sectors (for example, health and education) to create a holistic approach to investing in young children and their caregivers.
Several workshop participants emphasized the need to understand indicators and assessments that are common across all cultures and locations and those for which local context should be considered. Currently, context may not always be properly addressed, leading to inaccuracies in measurements and a misunderstanding of regional strengths and regional needs. Multiple speakers and participants discussed the need for a set of consistent, integrated metrics to measure progress toward early childhood development outcomes. That set of metrics should be small in number, easy to understand by a layperson, and harmonized throughout the community.
Various workshop speakers and participants discussed the importance of different socioeconomic trends and their associated factors that affect the development of young children. Individual speakers referred to the effect of inequality in the socioeconomic and caregiving environments among children. In particular, several speakers pointed out inequality in
BOX 1-1
Workshop on the Cost of Inaction Statement of Task
An ad hoc committee will plan and conduct an interactive public workshop featuring presentations and discussions that highlight opportunities for scientifically grounded investments in young children globally. Investments will be broadly conceived to include allocations of economic, natural, social, and other resources that sustain or promote human development and well-being. Speakers will explore the question of whether the science converges on a set of universal elements that support optimal development from preconception to age 8. Intersections across health, education, nutrition, living conditions, and social protection will be explored. Speakers will address elements that may vary by geographic context and issues affecting diverse populations, including children with disabilities. The science will be highlighted by a set of research presentations focused on interrelated themes of promoting optimal development through investing in young children and the potential economic consequences of inaction. The contexts of child development, including families and caregivers as well as culture and community, will be considered. The committee will identify specific topics to be addressed, develop the agenda, select and invite speakers and other participants, and moderate the discussions. An individually authored summary of the presentations and discussions at the workshop will be prepared by a designated rapporteur in accordance with institutional guidelines.
access to education, differential fertility rates among caregivers of young children and access to family planning tools, and caregiver income. Other important factors raised by many speakers included child disability status, caregiver mental health, particularly maternal depression, and HIV-infected caregivers.
Several participants articulated the need to understand the priorities for investment and a clear idea of the usefulness of today’s practices. Several speakers focused on how to assess the cost-effectiveness of different interventions. Additionally, some speakers identified how to determine benefit–cost ratios, including the use of systematic tools and economic considerations and pragmatic examples of successful government interventions.
