Down to Zero Baseline 2016 Report

In January 2016 the Down to Zero (DtZ) alliance, that includes Terre des Hommes Netherlands, Plan Netherlands, Defence for Children International-ECPAT Netherlands, Free a Girl and ICCO and is supported by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, has started implementing a 5-year programme to jointly address the issue of Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children (CSEC) in 11 countries in Asia and Latin America.

The programme focuses on child rights and especially the right to protection against sexual abuse and sexual exploitation. The programme aims to fight CSEC and prevent children at risk from becoming victims of CSEC and prevent child victims from becoming re-victimised. This is to be achieved through changing mind-sets and behaviour of the programme’s four key target actors: Children, Communities, Governments and the Private Sector. The key intermediary steps in the process of changing these mind-sets and behaviour, called progress markers, are outlined in the programme’s main and country-specific Theories of Change.

To enable measurement of progress and identify lessons learned from the programme, an evaluation agenda has been established, consisting of a programmatic baseline study (2016), a mid-term evaluation (2018) and a final evaluation (2020).

This document reflects the programmatic baseline study, describing the actual CSEC situation in the 11 programme countries at the beginning of the programme. This baseline CSEC situation is meant to be used as a basis for comparison to determine progress towards programme objectives to allow for programmatic steering and accountability.