Municipalities are at the frontline of development. They can play a crucial role in ensuring children and youth fully exercise their rights.

1. Making Municipal Policies Work For
Children and Youth
Juan Felipe Sanchez, Plan International’s Country Director on Special Assignment / Senior Children and Youth Specialist –
Children and Youth Unit, HDN, The World Bank
November 2006

2. Global Trends in Urban
Growth
• Growth in both large and smaller cities
• Diversity and inequality within cities
• Infrastructure and services gap in smaller
cities
• Spatially concentrated poverty: conditions
in urban slums can be worse than in rural
villages
Adapted from: Cities Transformed, National Academies Press, 2003
November 2006 JF Sanchez - HDNCY 2

3. World Population Growth Almost All Growth Will Occur
Will Be Mainly Urban in Cities of Poor Countries
Especially in Their Yet the Number of Large
Smaller Cities Cities Will Also Grow
Adapted from: Cities Transformed, National Academies Press, 2003
November 2006 JF Sanchez - HDNCY 3

4. Municipalities Are at the
Front-line of Development
• Municipalities can –and should- play a critical
role in establishing a microcosm of sustainable,
rights-based, development for children and
youth, the local community – and eventually for
the country itself
November 2006 JF Sanchez - HDNCY 4

5. New Policy and Program
Actors at the Local Level
• Decentralized Sectors (Health, Education, Water &
Sanitation, etc.)
• Proliferation of new Government units
• Private sector service providers
• NGOs (re-monitoring and/or service provision)
• Communities and community organizations -as
mechanisms for service delivery, and inclusion of children, youth
and their advocates
November 2006 JF Sanchez - HDNCY 5

6. Investing in Children and
Youth at the Municipal Level
• Towards a healthy and safe environment
• Investing along the life cycle
– Having a good start in life (0-5 years)
– Growing up healthy and educated (6-14 years)
– Productive and engaged citizens (15-24 years)
• Inclusion of the more vulnerable children and
youth –and women
November 2006 JF Sanchez - HDNCY 6

7. Ultimately, achieving two strategic priorities
for cross-sector strategies and investments
Age
24
Youth Development
(School-to-work, Second-chance programs,
Risky behaviors, participation, crime and violence)
18
Protection
Education
Health and
Nutrition
Social
14
5
Early Child Development
(Health/Nutrition, School Readiness, Parenting)
0
November 2006 JF Sanchez - HDNCY 7

8. The Challenge of Municipal
Governance
• Capacity
• e.g. organization structure and roles, human resources, data
• Financial resources
• dealing with differences in revenue; lag in assignments; risk of local capture of
resources
• Diversity
• urban-rural differences; segregation; fragmentation
• Security
• variations in crime and violence
• Inclusion
• multi-stakeholder collaborations; participation; vulnerable populations; social
accountability
November 2006 JF Sanchez - HDNCY 8

9. A three-pronged incidence strategy for
Plan, to strengthen public policies – to
make them work for children and youth
• Raising awareness
– through the creation of adequate national/local Information System for Children and
Adolescents (which includes a comprehensive data base on selected children and adolescent’s
indicators and program input/output indicators)
• Coordination
– through the organization and training of National / Local Commissions for Children and
Adolescents
• Participation
– through the involvement and training of Public / Community Development Councils, and through
the organization and participation of children, adolescents and women
November 2006 JF Sanchez - HDNCY 9

10. Specific Incidence Objectives
National/Local government - the “rights duty-bearers” in rights-based
approaches (together with other institutions) / the “supply side”:
– Creation and implementation of child-
adolescent-friendly public policies
– Development / delivery of integrated basic
services and protection systems for children
and adolescents (with a focus on specific –
agreed upon and implementable- rights)
Children, families and communities – the “rights-holders” / the “demand side”:
– Building capacity of children, adolescents,
women and communities to participate,
contribute to and benefit from these services
November 2006 JF Sanchez - HDNCY 10

11. Facilitating Actions to Achieve Positive
Outcomes for Children and Youth
Duty Bearers of Rights Rights Holders
Enabling Institutions, Policies and Information, Resources, Capacity
Programs (Supply Side interventions) (Demand Side interventions)
Creation of Delivery of Participation/
Integrated Basic Engagement by
Children/Youth- Women, Youth,
Friendly Public Services and
Protection System School-Aged Children
Policies (with a focus on specific rights) and Community
November 2006 JF Sanchez - HDNCY 11

12. Critical factors of Success for
Children/youth-focused Public Policies
• Community empowerment • Cross-sector investments
– the community –including children and youth and their
advocates - assuming responsibilities for their own and programs
development, with a clear and recognized mandate, – addressing risks and opportunities along the stages of
and the corresponding capacity to act --in terms of the life cycle, expanding opportunities, building
organization and control over resources capabilities, offering second chances
• Local government • Transparency in decision
empowerment making and use of
– decentralization of local government units and capacity
to facilitate community-based development approaches resources
(e.g. legal frameworks, systems, methodologies, field – For national/local government and community level
facilitators, budgets, monitoring, etc.) processes
• Availability of child/youth- • Accountability
–
focused data, planning and clear defined roles and responsibilities, and monitoring
of progress and results of local development actions,
participation tools with participation of all stakeholders
– age-specific data, analysis and methods, to facilitate
planning, program design and implementation,
participation processes, and monitoring/evaluation
• Learning
– the capacity to learn by doing, to improve effectiveness
of local development actions
November 2006 JF Sanchez - HDNCY 12