Supporting the development, strengthening, and coordination of child protection systems to ensure children are free from violence, abuse, neglect and exploitation.
Where social policy works, children thrive.
Social Policy determines whether children are protected, families stay together, and societies invest where it matters most.
Child-centered social policy for resilience, equity, and impact
Social Policy determines whether children and families can access income support, services, protection and opportunities —and whether systems respond equitably to poverty, crisis, and change. Yet in many contexts, social policies remain fragmented, underfunded, or disconnected from the realities children and families face, while economic shocks, conflict, displacement, inequality and climate risks place increasing pressure on already strained systems. Ensuring social policy delivers for children requires deliberate, child-centered approaches that align policy design with financing, services and implementation across all levels of government.
Maestral International strengthens social policy as a foundational public good, anchored in equity, rights, and accountability. The Social Policy Thematic Hub brings together social protection, child protection, care reform, social service workforce strengthening, and public finance to advance inclusive, gender-responsive, and climate-aware systems that address intersecting marginalization.
What sets Maestral apart is our ability to bridge policy ambition and practical delivery. We support governments and partners to translate commitments into costed, implementable systems by aligning laws, budgets, workforce capacity, and services so policies work in practice. By strengthening public finance for children and combining evidence with applied tools, we help demonstrate the social and economic returns of investing in children as a foundation for long-term human capital development.
Public Finance for Children
Strengthening how governments plan, budget, and invest so resources reach children equitably and social policies are backed by sustainable, accountable financing.
Social Service Workforce Strengthening
Contributing to a skilled and supported workforce to implement social policies aimed at preventing violence, connecting families to services, and upholding children’s rights.
Climate Change & Child Protection
Integrating child protection into climate policy and adaptation and ensuring climate considerations are embedded within child protection systems, so responses address climate-driven risks, shocks, and displacement affecting children and families.
The Social Policy Hub is a platform for shared learning, innovation, and collaboration – responding to evolving challenges. By strengthening how policies are designed, financed, and implemented, the Hub supports more resilient systems and better outcomes for children, today and in the future.
From Ghana to Myanmar to Romania and beyond, Maestral helps turn social policy commitments into tangible change for children and families. We do this by strengthening the social service workforce, advancing integrated cash-plus-care solutions, and supporting public finance for children. The projects below illustrate our Social Policy portfolio in practice.
Supporting social service workforce preparedness and strengthening in MENA
Middle East and North Africa
Maestral supported UNICEF’s MENA, Iran, Jordan, Qatar, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen to strengthen social service workforce (SSW) systems across the region using a participatory, human-centred approach the project advanced workforce professionalisation, systems strengthening, and intersectoral integration. Key results included nationally endorsed workforce strategies and action plans, large-scale training needs assessments, in-service training curricula, policy briefs, and regionally applicable public goods on gender, disability inclusion, financing, and humanitarian-development coherence. Together, these efforts laid a strong foundation for scalable, resilient, and inclusive SSW reform across MENA.
National study and cost analysis of institutional care and family-based alternative care for children in India, CTWWC
South Asia
Maestral supported the Commission for the Welfare of Women and Children to generate India’s first national evidence on the cost-effectiveness of institutional care compared to family-based alternative care. Using mixed methods, the study analysed public financing, service delivery models, and child outcomes across multiple states, and developed practical costing tools aligned with Mission Vatsalya. The findings demonstrate that family-based care delivers better developmental outcomes for children and generates substantial long-term cost savings for government. The study provides a strong investment case for care reform, supporting India’s transition from institutionalisation toward strengthened families, reintegration, and sustainable family-based care systems.
Scaling up a package of cash and care for children to reduce poverty and social exclusions in Romania
Europe and Central Asia
In 2021, UNICEF Romania commissioned an Investment Case for Children to assess the costs and benefits of scaling an integrated package of cash benefits and preventive care services to reduce child poverty and social exclusion. Developed through a government-led, multi-sectoral process, the analysis combined cost–benefit modelling with evidence from Romania’s Minimum Package of Services. The study demonstrates that integrating cash transfers with coordinated social, health, and education services delivers strong socio-economic returns, reduces poverty, and improves long-term outcomes for children. The findings provide a compelling case for accelerating reforms to integrate cash and care nationally.
National Social Protection Strategy – Myanmar
East Asia and the Pacific
Myanmar’s first National Social Protection Strategy, Social Protection for All, sets out a life-cycle, universal approach to reducing poverty and vulnerability. Developed through a government-led, multi-sectoral process chaired by the Ministry of Social Welfare with UNICEF support, the Strategy identifies priority programmes including child and maternal allowances, disability benefits, school feeding, public employment, and social pensions. Evidence shows these flagship interventions could reduce income poverty by over one-third. The Strategy also outlines the development of an integrated system, including a professional social work workforce, to strengthen resilience, inclusion, and disaster responsiveness nationwide.
Developing Costing Models for Child Protection in Ebola Recovery
West and Central Africa
Maestral provided technical support to develop evidence-based costing models for the child protection components of Ebola recovery plans in Liberia, Guinea, and Sierra Leone. Working closely with governments and partners, the project quantified the resources needed to respond to Ebola-related risks—including orphanhood, family separation, violence, stigma, child labour, and adolescent pregnancy—while strengthening systems for the long term. Using government budgets, MTEFs, and macroeconomic projections, the models supported investment in social service workforce development, family-based care, psychosocial support, household assistance and system coordination, aligning recovery financing with national child welfare policies and laying the foundations for resilient, sustainable child protection systems beyond the Ebola crisis.
Development of a Framework for Action for a transformative public private partnership to Advance children’s rights in Coted’Ivoire and Ghana
West and Central Africa
Maestral supported the development of a Framework for Action for Children First in Cocoa, a transformative public–private partnership in Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana aimed at advancing children’s rights across the cocoa value chain. Building on the Harkin–Engel Protocol and national action plans, the work brought together governments, industry, UN agencies, and civil society to identify gaps and priorities across four pillars: adequate living standards, child protection, education, and health. The Framework provides a shared roadmap to address the root causes of child labour through coordinated, systemic, and sustainable interventions.
