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Sustainability | ~ 4 min read

Fostering a grown-up approach to children’s rights

Mark Wade

The widespread use of social media and smart phones is one example of an emerging area of risk affecting children’s rights and wellbeing. The prevalence of these risks is highlighting the need to embed the full scope of children’s rights into business and economic decision-making.

Recognition of the need to protect children’s rights – and to consider any infringement to them as a material risk – is becoming urgent. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child is the leading guidance on considering childrens’ rights within human rights. However, aside from prompting industry-specific standards addressing child labour, there are no universal conventions covering emerging issues such as technology, nutrition, vaping or even climate transition.

Taking place this month, the annual Global Child Forum focuses on the importance of protecting the rights of children as a sustainability issue. As active long-term investors, we view these challenges as material and have developed three categories for considering them:

  • Experiences – the right to life experiences (such as education) that contribute to development.
  • Protection – safety in achieving these experiences.
  • Agency – influence over their own experiences and protection.
Exhibit 1: Developing a children’s rights framework

Sources: See footnotes for full attribution1
View the full articles on the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child here.

New risks compound existing challenges

Although the UN has targeted the elimination of child labour by 2025,2 progress has stalled and risks reversing. The number of children aged 5-17 years in labour globally increased from 151.6 million in 2016 to 160 million in 2020,3 and close to half work in hazardous conditions. Two key challenges stand out:

  • While the scale of child labour is most prevalent in Africa4, the risk of child labour is rising fastest in North America.5 Recognising this challenge beyond emerging markets is critical, especially given the nascent and growing issues mentioned above.
  • Agriculture accounts for 70% of global child labour – a figure that rises to more than 80% in Sub-Saharan Africa.6 While global changes in this sector will be slow, corporate-level advances can help inform standards for other industries and government policy development. Examples of standards include the living income reference price – which means decent pay for farmers and their employees – and child labour monitoring and remediation systems.
Prioritising future generations

Maximising opportunities and mitigating risks for children are core to global economic development and growth. Exhibit 2 shows our structured approach to research, engagement and investment with respect to children’s rights.

Exhibit 2: How to consider children’s rights in investments
Exhibit 2: How to consider children’s rights in investments

Source: AllianzGI Sustainability Research, 2024

Incorporating these issues into our investment decisions reflects our commitment to advancing social sustainability and inclusive capitalism7 – and recognises the absolute importance of protecting children and giving them every opportunity to thrive.

For more reading on topics raised in this blog post, please visit
Human rights – the weakest link in supply chains, November 2023
Healthcare - how to live better, July 2024
Rewiring technology for sustainable growth, October 2024

1 Sources: Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948); International Labour Organisation (1973, 1999); United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989); UN Global Compact, UNICEF and Save the Children (2010); UNICEF (2022), and Allianz Global Investors, 2024
2 UN Sustainable Development Goals: Goal 8, 2015
3 International Labour Organization and United Nations Children’s Fund Global Estimates 2020, Trend and the Road Forward – Executive Summary,2021
4 European Union External Action Service, Acting together to end child labour in agriculture | EEAS (europa.eu), 2021 International Labour Organization, Knowledge sharing forum: Innovative solutions to reduce child labour and forced labour in Africa, 2024
5 Verisk Maplecroft, Child labour, migrant worker risks rising fastest in US - Child Labour Index July 2024
6 International Labour Organization and United Nations Children’s Fund Global Estimates 2020, Trend and the Road Forward – Executive Summary,2021
7 Unlocking the “S” in capitalism (allianzgi.com)

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