2024 Update:

To further the adoption of the Child-lens Investing Framework (CLIF) in development context, UNICEF has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Finnfund - the Finnish Development Finance Institution (DFI) to explore pathways to implement the CLIF and foster positive outcomes for children, particularly in the areas of digitalization and education. Moreover, UNICEF has initiated discussions with several other DFIs and impact investors to explore adoption of child-lens investing. UNICEF (Innovative Finance Hub together with UNICEF USA) aims to continue to build this new field of investing and a Community of Practice of anchor investors/adopters of child-lens investing. In October 2024, child-lens investing which was developed was internationally recognized and was selected as one of TIME Best Inventions 2024. 

Commitment:

Enhancing the CLIF involves tailoring sector-specific and thematic directives to address children's challenges in frontier markets, protracted crisis, and fragile states. Investment criteria with focus on children to attract private capital are not necessarily useful in fragile and humanitarian context. This initiative bridges the gap between key investment strategies and areas affecting children, such as agriculture's impact on stunting, malnutrition, and food diversity, relevant facets of WASH for child welfare, digital infrastructure's influence on learning outcomes, and identified gaps. While familiar to UNICEF and experts, translating this knowledge into investor guidance is ground-breaking. It highlights varying impacts of business types within industries and identifies optimal products and solutions for child-centric investment, previously unexplored in the humanitarian and protracted crisis context.

Creating user-friendly, aligned investor guidance tailored for children in humanitarian setting will amplify resources for impact investment. Through comprehensive market studies and engagement in global forums, it's evident that investments targeting child-focused impact are appealing to many investors. To ensure sustainability in frontier markets, CLIF and risk mitigation tools which are relevant and applicable in fragile and humanitarian context is essential for a consistent investment pipeline.