The Inclusive Futures Initiative (IFI), on Friday, unveiled its inaugural knowledge products aimed at strengthening the protection of women, children and young people in Nigeria through evidence-based policymaking, institutional collaboration and improved accountability.

The initiative was designed to connect government policies, budgets, institutional records and interventions to address gaps that have continued to undermine efforts to protect vulnerable groups.

Speaking during the launch, the executive director of IFI, Adewke Aloba, said that Nigeria had invested considerable resources in advocacy, research and programmes to advance the rights of women, children and young people, yet many of the challenges remained unresolved because interventions were often implemented in isolation.

She said the initiative was promoting a systems-based approach that would enable organisations to identify gaps, share expertise and coordinate efforts towards achieving measurable outcomes.

According to her, addressing technology-facilitated gender-based violence, for instance, requires collaboration among public finance experts, digital rights advocates and frontline organisations supporting survivors.

Aloba said: “We are introducing knowledge products designed to make these relationships more visible. By examining the issues, policies, investments, actors and interventions, we hope to provide a stronger evidence base for asking better questions, making better decisions and identifying opportunities for collective action for women, children and young people in Nigeria.”

Aloba explained that the knowledge products were developed to make the relationships between policies, investments, institutions and interventions more visible, providing a stronger evidence base for decision-making and collective action.

She urged civil society organisations, policymakers, researchers and development partners to engage with the evidence, challenge existing assumptions and contribute their expertise, networks and resources to building more effective systems.

Also speaking, the Chief Executive Officer of Luminate, Melanie Hui, said the growing influence of technology across different sectors made collaboration increasingly important in addressing emerging social challenges.

Hui said supporting initiatives such as IFI would help communities shape a digital future that reflected their aspirations, while ensuring that technology companies did not become the sole determinants of how digital technologies affected people’s lives.

In her remarks, the Regional Director of Luminate Africa, Mrs Toyin Akinniyi, said sustainable progress for women, children and young people required an effective system connecting legal protections with the institutions, resources aqnd services necessary to enforce them.

Akinniyi said the existence of laws and policies did not automatically guarantee that people could exercise their rights, stressing the need for capable institutions, adequate funding, reliable information and accessible mechanisms for seeking redress.

She warned that when support services failed to work together, survivors of abuse were often left to navigate complex systems on their own.

According to her, although technology can help young people access information and support, it can also expose them to abuse, privacy violations and other forms of harm.

She said the legal and policy research unveiled by IFI would help stakeholders examine the gaps between promised protections and people’s actual experiences, while its ecosystem intelligence map would show the relationships between organisations, interventions and resources.

Meanwhile, the Chief Executive Officer of IFI, Lucy OKonkwo, called for greater use of data in policymaking and improved institutional capacity to address challenges affecting women and children.

Okonkwo said the organisation’s research drew on information from the National Bureau of Statistics and other credible sources, adding that evidence-based policies would help stakeholders identify priorities and develop appropriate responses.

She acknowledged that implementation of existing policies had recorded some progress but said more needed to be done to translate government commitments into meaningful results.

On child labour, the IFI chief executive identified poverty as one of its major drivers, explaining that some families resorted to sending their children to work because they could not meet their basic needs.