Ethiopia Shows Progress on Child Well being, but Slow Rate: Report

Addis Ababa January 17/2019 Ethiopia has made progress in improving children well beings though the rate of change has been rather slow, a report disclosed.

“A Multi-dimensional Child Deprivation in Ethiopia,” the report studied child poverty, revealed that nearly 36 million children in Ethiopia are poor and lack access to basic social services.

The report released today by Central Statistical Agency (CSA) and UNICEF shows the country has made imperative investments in its people which have lifted millions out of poverty, including children.

However, the report pointed out the rate of change for children have been slow which needs Ethiopia to promote multi-sectoral approach in program and policy design for effectively ending child poverty.

Child is the heart of the analytical tool employed by the report.

The study applied UNICEF’s Multiple Overlapping Deprivation Analysis (MODA) methodology to Ethiopian context in analyzing the situation by using the data from Ethiopian Demographic and Health Survey (EDHS) conducted in 2011 and 2016.

Six dimensions have been selected in implementing MODA and measuring the deprivation incidence based on children’s age, categorizing under five and five to seventeen years old.

Nutrition, development, health, sanitation, water, and housing dimensions are used to analyzing the child well being of children under five while education, housing health, related knowledge, information and participation,  sanitation and water dimensions are selected for children among 5-17.

Accordingly, the report concluded that sanitation, housing and nutrition which account 90, 89 and 73 % respectively are the highest deprivation incidence for children under five.

The report also posited that children residing in rural areas experienced higher deprivation rate than urban areas that account 94 and 42 percent respectively.

The report recommended prioritization of budget allocation on child poverty alleviation and an integrated approach across sectors to reduce child poverty since the child deprivation is multidimensional.

Ethiopia needs an increased focus to develop a national pathway that helps reducing and ending child poverty, the report proposed.

Moreover, regular collection of data on child specific indicators is essential in monitoring the progress of the government’s achievement of SDGs particularly 1.2 goal of SDG.