Children’s Voices for the #GlobalGoals is a collection of children’s aspirations, priorities and recommendations for the post-2015 development agenda brought together in an interactive site ( http://voices.freefromviolence.org ).

Wednesday 23rd September

The site is being launched by ChildFund Alliance at a special event in New York City today to celebrate the role children’s voices played in the formulation of the post-2015 development agenda, and the protection of children from violence and exploitation being included in the new set of goals and targets. This has been the focus of ChildFund Alliance’s worldwide advocacy campaign over the past three years.

During that time, ChildFund Alliance engaged with over 16,000 children across 50 countries, capturing their thoughts and views on one of the most pressing challenges to development: violence against children, and their own aspirations for what the new global priorities should be.

In this new one-stop site, users will be able to visualize and interact with all the data and information that ChildFund Alliance has gathered from the children throughout its consultations, focus group discussions and surveys, published in four reports. Interactive maps and charts allow users to navigate across the reports and compare the different answers between regions.

Children were asked questions such as: If you were the leader of the country, what would you do to improve the lives of children? What do you think are the main causes of violence in your country? What are the top risks for children that world leaders should address?

Their answers are both revealing and inspiring. A 13-year-old girl from Timor Leste said: “My dream in the future is for parents, teachers, and community leaders to take real actions to stop violence and every form of exploitation against children.” A 16-year-old boy from Nicaragua said: “All the goals are important and are related to each other. What we have to do is get commitments from everyone as this is a shared responsibility and it does not only rely on the rich or poor countries.”

In addition:

• Children wanted the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to be fulfilled and the protection of children from violence to be added as a global priority.
• Almost one in every three children in developing countries believe their rights to protection from violence are not being upheld in their country. Despite their awareness of horrendous violations to their rights, children know what needs to be done: they want their leaders to create and enforce laws that protect them, perpetrators to be punished, and the public to be aware.
• Children aspire to have their rights fulfilled and to be able to exercise their fundamental freedoms: they want to speak and be heard; they want everyone to have access to quality education and healthcare; they want equality for everyone regardless of their class, disability, ethnicity, gender, or race.
• Children want to live in a clean and safe environment, with more trees planted than cut, less use of toxic materials and more recycling, and less greenhouse emissions and cleaner air.
• Children want to be involved in the monitoring of the new global goals, they are aware of the importance of measuring progress at the local level, and with direct engagement of the communities.

Meg Gardinier, Secretary General of ChildFund Alliance said: “This interactive site contains a wealth of data captured directly from children in Africa, the Americas, Asia Pacific and Europe. ChildFund Alliance will continue to ensure that children are fully engaged in making sure these global goals are translated into action, empowering them to contribute to a world where they are ‘free from violence and exploitation.’ These are Children’s Voices for the #GlobalGoals.”