In 2021, UNICEF HQ and the UN SRSG-VAC commissioned Cornerstone to investigate the economic costs of VAC. This involved a detailed review of over 80 studies that seek to estimate the cost of violence against children, and the writing of a paper – Preventing Violence Against Children Makes Economic Sense (2021). This paper served as the basis for the multi-agency publication titled The Violence Prevention Dividend, which presents the primary arguments for governments to increase investments in child protection, preventing violence and strengthening the social services workforce.
Also based on this work, Simon Halvey, who is part of the Cornerstone team, presented on The Economic Case for Investing in Ending Violence Against Children at the 1ST Global Ministerial Conference on Ending Violence Against Children in Bogota, Columbia in November 2024.
Flowing from this work, the Office of the UN Special Representative of the Secretary General for VAC launched the toolkit for building the investment case for ending violence against children. The Cornerstone-team was responsible for writing this document.