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This annual report highlights progress made to advance the wellbeing, protection, and rights of children and young people across our program areas in Ethiopia. It presents key achievements in education, child protection, health and nutrition, water and sanitation, livelihoods, youth development, humanitarian assistance, and environmental sustainability and resilience, while reflecting on challenges encountered and lessons learned in a changing operating environment.

This annual report 2025 highlights progress made in 2025 to advance the wellbeing, protection, and rights of children and young people across our program areas in Ethiopia. It presents key achievements in education, child protection, health and nutrition, water and sanitation, livelihoods, youth development, humanitarian assistance, and environmental sustainability and resilience, while reflecting on challenges encountered and lessons learned in a changing operating environment.

This annual report 2025 highlights progress made in 2025 to advance the wellbeing, protection, and rights of children and young people across our program areas in Ethiopia. It presents key achievements in education, child protection, health and nutrition, water and sanitation, livelihoods, youth development, humanitarian assistance, and environmental sustainability and resilience, while reflecting on challenges encountered and lessons learned in a changing operating environment. The report also outlines our partnerships, program approaches, and use of resources, demonstrating how ChildFund worked with communities, government, and partners to deliver accountable, locally led, and sustainable results for children and their families.

ChildFund Ethiopia’s current Country Strategic Plan 2022 – 2026 has an ambitious goal to reach approximately 7 million children, their families, and communities annually by the end of 2026. During this period, we will strive to explore more innovative and creative ways to scale up our reach and impact, through embracing technology, adopt digitalization, improving our systems for efficiency, building on our program models, expanding our humanitarian footprint, and diversifying our funding base and scaling up our fundraising. We are cognizant that we cannot do this on our own and expanding our partnerships will be critical to achieving this goal.

ChildFund International is on an exciting journey. With our newest organizational strategy, Growing Connections 2030, we look toward a future where we will not only create impact with more children and families than ever before, but we will do so through expanded partnerships and deeper relationships. As the world changes, the people and institutions focused on child well-being must rise to its new challenges and help more children connect with what they need to thrive. It is more urgent than ever that we rise to those challenges together — so that children can rise to theirs. We hope our vision for the future of our work inspires you to join us on this path. Because, to reach our ambitious goals, we need each other.

When young people are not active participants in the decision-making processes that affect their lives, they—and their communities—often suffer worse outcomes. Too often, decisions that will affect young people’s lives are made solely by parents, local and religious leaders, teachers, governments and others without the input of youth themselves. Young people who are in marginalized communities, living with disabilities, or facing unfair gender disparities face even tougher development barriers to having their voices heard. By focusing on youth agency and positive youth development, ChildFund supports the principle that young people are empowered to reach their full potential through skill-building, fostering healthy relationships, strengthening families and communities, and transforming systems.

Young people make up a huge proportion of the world’s population. Roughly 1.8 billion people are between the ages of 10 and 241, and the challenges they face today are stark: In 2020, more than 1 in five young people worldwide aged 15-24 was not employed, in job training or in school, and this has only worsened since the COVID-19 pandemic. ChildFund’s livelihood programming focuses broadly on youth work and entrepreneurial skills, employability and work readiness. Many of our programs also overlap with youth participation programming and adolescent sexual and reproductive health so we are able to holistically support youth through this life stage, properly preparing them not only for work, but for being able to stay employed, continue their education and remain safe and healthy.

At ChildFund, we characterize our impact in Africa, Asia, and the Americas using four key dimensions: (1) the positive change we see in our core outcomes as measured by performance data — our global monitoring of key indicators and our programming evidence; (2) by the feedback we receive from children, families, sponsors, partners, and stakeholders on how our work with them has made a positive difference in their lives — and in their communities; (3) how we apply learning about what works well and does not work well in our programs and strategies to improve outcomes; and (4) how we contribute to global, collective outcomes for children and their families — the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).