The overall objective of the project is to promote effective sub-regional governance of migration and migratory flows that integrates a protection, social inclusion and rights-based approach for migrant children and young people between Côte d’Ivoire, Mali and Burkina Faso. Specifically, this involves improving the data management system related to the migratory movements of children and young people between Côte d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso and Mali, and strengthening the role of social services in coordinating, managing and sharing information on the mobility and social integration of migrant children and young people among the services involved in protection.
In terms of good practices, it should be noted: the collaboration of all stakeholders, notably transport unions, motorcycle-taxi unions, ECOWAS, and security forces, which facilitated access for outreach workers (APE) to bus stations, corridors and vehicles to identify migrant children and young people; an adjustment of objectives that allowed the IGT to reach its assigned targets within a short timeframe, resulting in the production of maps and atlases using CaseData data to obtain results more quickly; training of all project stakeholders on child protection in general and specifically on Save the Children’s child safeguarding policy; and teamwork initiated by some outreach workers, who brought in colleagues to help identify migrant children and young people at fixed points, allowing them to reach the project’s targets more quickly.
The evaluation report clearly states that Service Social International West Africa (SSI-AO) has proven experience in setting up and managing databases on transnational migration. It maintains a sub-regional database (CaseData Online) on the cross-border migration of children and young people. Under the project, SSI-AO is a co-applicant, responsible for setting up databases in the 12 pilot social services and strengthening the capacities of social services and their regional and central directorates in registering and managing the offline database.
The evaluation was thus able to highlight the relevance of the program, whose interventions are fully in line with those developed under sub-regional and national policy documents of the Ivorian, Burkinabe and Malian governments. By committing to managing the migration of children and young people, SSI-AO and Save the Children have asserted their leadership on child protection issues by establishing themselves in the specific field of data management. The availability of databases in each project country drives the traceability of migration data for children and young people — data that had previously received little attention. 13,576 migrant children and young people were identified as part of the project. However, the priority given to systematic identification and tracing of migration routes and causes led to a limited response to basic social needs such as health, food, and legal and judicial protection, resulting in limited support for children in cross-border mobility in the three countries where the project was implemented.
