Child Protection Officer

La mission fondamentale de l’UNICEF est de promouvoir les droits de chaque enfant, partout, dans tout ce que l’Organisation fait – à travers les programmes, les plaidoyers et les opérations. La stratégie d’équité, soulignant les enfants et familles les plus défavorisés et exclus, traduit cet engagement en faveur des droits des enfants en action. Pour l’UNICEF, l’équité signifie que tous les enfants ont l’opportunité de survivre, de se développer et d’atteindre leurs pleins potentiels, sans discrimination, préjugé ou favoritisme. Dans la mesure où tout enfant a une chance inégale dans la vie – dans une dimension sociale, politique, économique et civique – ses droits sont enfreints. Il y a de plus en plus d’évidences pour la santé, l’éducation et la protection des citoyens les plus défavorisés d’une société – luttant contre les inégalités – non seulement vont donner l’opportunité de réaliser leur potentiel à plus d’enfants, mais aussi vont conduire à une croissance soutenue et à la stabilité des pays. C’est pourquoi la concentration sur l’équité est si vital. Ceci accélère le progrès vers la réalisation des droits humains de tous les enfants, qui est le mandat universel de l’UNICEF, comme décrit dans la Convention relative aux droits des enfants, tout en soutenant le développement équitable des nations.

Violence against children (VAC) is a serious violation of children’s rights, which also impacts negatively on social, economic, health and behavioural outcomes Violence against children takes many forms. It can be physical, emotional or sexual. It happens in all countries and any setting – in a child's home, community, school and online. In some parts of the world, violent discipline is socially accepted and common. And for many girls and boys, violence comes at the hands of the people they trust – their parents or caregivers, teachers, peers and neighbours. Childhood survivors of violence are more likely to mature into adolescents and adult perpetrators and/or victims of violence, thereby perpetuating the inter-generational cycle of violence.

In Madagascar, violence against children takes many different forms, and many children face multiple forms of violence and protection risks throughout the course of their childhood. In Madagascar, 39% of women and 11% of men aged 20-24 were married or in union before the age of 18. 47% of children aged 5-17 years old are engaged in labour, including worst forms of child labour, 11.5% of girls aged 15-19 are victims of sexual violence and 86% of children aged 1-14 have already experienced violent forms of discipline.

Although some components of Madagascar's child protection system are in place, it remains fragmented and weak. Fragmented and compartmentalised approaches to preventing and responding to violence adopted by different actors have meant that many children have fallen through the cracks of the system. Many partners contribute to the availability of services but use different approaches and tools. Although some standards and tools developed by the government are available, they are not implemented, applied or widely known. It is therefore necessary to continue the shift from a issue-based approach to a systems strengthening approach in order to support government to define, establish and strengthen a comprehensive child protection system at national and sub-national levels that protects children from violence, abuse, neglect and exploitation, linking with justice, police, health, education and other sectors.

UNICEF Madagascar’s country programme cycle started in 2024 until 2028. The child protection outcome of the country programme focuses on defining, putting in place and strengthening a comprehensive and functional national and sub-national child protection system that prevents violence against children including gender-based violence and delivers quality and equitable response services to survivors and victims. As part of its Core Commitments for Children in Humanitarian Action, UNICEF continues to provide critical life-saving child protection services to emergency affected children in Madagascar to ensure their protection from all forms of violence.

Under the direct supervision of Child Protection Specialist, the UN Volunteer will undertake the following tasks:

1. Support the child protection programme development and planning, specifically in the area of child protection prevention service provision.
• Contribute to the situation analysis around violence against children for the development, design and management of programme activities related to mainstreaming prevention service provision.
• Support the programme sections in implementing child protection risk mitigation and prevention interventions across UNICEF’s core programmatic programmes in nutrition, health, WASH and social protection
• Contribute to the development of UNICEF Madagascar’s child protection preven-tion intervention goals, objectives, strategies, and planning through research, analysis and reporting of child protection, specifically on prevention of all forms of VAC and including the needs of children effected by emergencies, including droughts, floods and cyclones.
• Assist in technical and operational support by executing a variety of technical, pro-gramme, operational, and administrative transactions, preparing related materials and documentations, to support programme planning and monitoring and evaluating of results.
• Support the programme documentations, materials and data to facilitate the programme review for child protection regularly.
2. Programme management, monitoring and delivery of results on child protection prevention against programme targets and indicators.
• Work closely and collaboratively with colleagues and partners to discuss implementation issues, provide solutions, recommendations. Keep records of reports and assessments on violence against children for easy reference and to capture and institutionalize lessons learned around prevention of all forms of violence.
• Participate in monitoring and evaluation exercises, programme reviews and sectoral reviews with partners to assess programmes on child protection, and to report on required action/interventions at the higher level of programme management.
• Support in the monitoring and reporting on the use of child protection prevention programme resources, verifying compliance with approved allocations, organizational rules, regulations, procedures and donor commitments.
• Assist in the preparation of regular and mandated sectoral programme reports for management, donors and partners to keep them informed of child protection pre-vention programme interventions.

3. Technical and operational support for the implementation of the child protection programme, focused on child protection systems strengthening through strengthening the prevention component by integrating prevention of VAC component into all sector programming and implementation both in development and humanitarian contexts.
• Participate in regular programme field visits and surveys and exchange information with partners/stakeholders to assess progress and provide technical support. Con-tribute to ideas to resolve issues and/or refer to relevant officials for resolution. Re-port on critical issues, bottlenecks and potential problems for timely action to achieve results.

4. Networking and partnership building for prevention of violence against children
• Assist in building and sustaining effective close working partnerships with government counterparts and national stakeholders through active sharing of information and knowledge to facilitate programme implementation and build to achieve and sustain results on child protection in the area of prevention service provision.
• Research information on potential donors and prepare resource mobilization materials and briefs for fundraising and partnership development purposes in the area of child protection system strengthening, including specifically child protection pre-vention service provision.
• Draft communication and information materials for UNICEF Madagascar Country Office programme advocacy to promote awareness, establish partnership/alliances and support fundraising for child protection programmes.

5. Innovation, knowledge management and capacity building for child protection
• Identify, capture, synthesize, and share lessons learned for knowledge development and to build the capacity of stakeholders on child protection and prevention of violence.
• Apply innovative approaches and promote good practices to support the implementation and delivery of concrete and sustainable programme results to prevent violence against children.
• Research and report on best practices for development planning of knowledge products and systems on child protection system strengthening including in the area of prevention service provision, in development and humanitarian contexts.
• Participate as a resource person in capacity building initiatives to enhance the competencies of UNICEF Madagascar partners on child protection.