WHO WE ARE
Haiti’s 4.25 million children faced a bleak future following the earthquake of January 12, 2010. Not only did the earthquake create new challenges to child protection, it also exacerbated pre-existing vulnerabilities that limited the fulfillment of children’s rights. Three years later, Haitian children continue to face myriad challenges to their protection, resilience, and development. Despite dedicated efforts and significant achievements, national and international response and development actors face formidable obstacles in addressing the protection needs of Haiti’s vulnerable children and adolescents, including those who are orphaned, separated from their families, or at risk of abandonment or violence, abuse, and exploitation. Evidence-based decision-making is complicated by a lack of clarity on the level and scope of research and knowledge on the child protection situation in Haiti before the earthquake, and by knowledge gaps in key areas.
To meet this challenge, the FXB Center has undertaken a systematic analysis of Haiti’s child protection situation before and after the 2010 earthquake. Protecting Haiti’s Children: Risk Factors and Outcomes Before and Since the January 2010 Earthquake examines the types of child protection, security, and developmental threats that Haitian children have faced before and after the earthquake and how children and their families respond to these threats. The report assesses the available body of knowledge of child protection in Haiti and highlights areas where this knowledge should be expanded, deepened, or re-oriented.
Protecting Haiti’s children requires a holistic assessment of risk factors that contribute to their vulnerability and resilience. For this reason, “operational” definitions of child protection, which require the categorization of those in need, such as child laborers, separated and unaccompanied children, and children in contact with the law, are less useful to inter-sectoral decision-makers than information pertaining to current basic needs and risk factors. Protecting Haiti’s Children recognizes that child protection is inextricably linked to familial and social context, and that outcomes are shaped by dynamic relationships among risk factors. Consequently, the report presents the current state of child protection in Haiti from the perspective of risk factors, outcomes, trends, and key gaps in knowledge. This perspective allows policymakers and programmers to make evidence-based decisions, complements and provides the foundation for future projects related to child protection, and assists the Haitian and international community build a better future for Haiti’s children.
It is hoped that the project will bring renewed attention to the protection and promotion of children in Haiti and serve as a foundation for evidence-based policy and programs by Haitian and international organizations advancing the rights and well-being of Haitian children.
Read the full report here:
Protecting Haiti’s Children: Risk Factors and Outcomes Before and Since the January 2010 Earthquake (Full Report – 17.6mb)
