Child Safeguarding Consultant | Global Advocate for Missing Children
Maryana Munyendo
Founder & Executive Director, Missing Child Kenya
About Me
Maryana Munyendo is a leading child rights advocate and pioneer in missing children response systems in Africa. She has developed innovative, technology-driven frameworks that combine community engagement, policy reform, and digital alert systems to safeguard children. Her leadership contributed to the launch of Kenya’s Emergency Child Alert System (KECA), modeled after the AMBER Alert System, in partnership with national authorities (DCI) and global technology stakeholders (Meta), positioning Kenya as a regional pioneer in structured missing child response mechanisms. She has also developed child safety education programs that train children, teachers, and caregivers in preventative safeguarding strategies.
In July 2016, she founded Missing Child Kenya Foundation, a nonprofit, community-led initiative that uses technology and crowdsourcing to search, trace, and reunify missing, displaced, lost, and found children with their families. The organization operates Kenya’s only toll-free helpline, 0800 22 33 44, dedicated to responding to emergencies involving missing and displaced children, while linking them to essential short- and long-term care and rehabilitation services. Through open data, the public can search the online image poster database using the hashtag #MissingChildKE through any web browser.
Through the strategic use of technology, real-time social media alerts, and nationwide community mobilization, her organization has supported over 1,800 reported cases and facilitated the safe recovery of more than 1,200 children.
In September 2019, she was recognized among the Top 40 Under 40 Kenyan Women for her groundbreaking work as Kenya’s first national champion for missing children’s rights. She is a founding member of the Technical Working Group spearheaded by the Directorate of Children’s Services to develop standardized procedures for responding to missing children in Kenya.
Maryana is an alumna of the Leadership for 21st Century Africa program at Harvard Kennedy School. She is a 2016 Fellow of the Kenya School of Internet Governance and was nominated as an Eisenhower Fellow for the Fall 2020 Women’s Leadership Cohort. She serves on the Kenya Advisory Board for Free the Slaves and convenes the Africa Missing Children Network, fostering cross-border collaboration to reunite missing children with their families.
A children’s author, the book High 5, the first in the Safety Stories Series for ages 3–6, promotes child safeguarding through relatable everyday adventures. Her work and professional engagements focus on technology and child protection, policy innovation, enhanced data sharing, forensic records, community-centered safeguarding systems, capacity building, and global collaboration to advance scalable child safety solutions worldwide.
She brings a unique combination of frontline experience, strategic leadership, and global collaboration, offering practical insights that are both scalable and adaptable across regions.
Speaking Topics
Future-Focused Systems & Innovation
- The Future of Missing Child Response Systems
- Policy Innovation in Child Protection Systems
- Data-Driven Approaches to Strengthening Child Safeguarding
Technology, AI & Data in Child Protection
- The Role of Technology & AI in Child Protection
- Leveraging Technology and Data to Strengthen Missing Child Response Systems
- Ethical Use of Data and Digital Tools in Child Safeguarding
Policy, Governance & Systems Reform
- Policy Reform for Effective Child Protection Systems
- Strengthening Legal and Institutional Frameworks for Child Safeguarding
- Evidence-Based Policymaking in Child Protection
Public-Private & Multi-Sector Partnerships
- Public-Private Partnerships in Child Safeguarding
- Multi-Sector Collaboration for Missing Child Response
- Cross-Border and Inter-Agency Coordination in Child Protection
Community-Centered & Preventative Approaches
- Building Community-Centered Child Protection Frameworks
- Preventative Child Safety Strategies at the Community Level
- Engaging Families and Communities in Safeguarding Efforts
Training, Capacity Building & Education
- Training Frameworks for Educators and Caregivers
- Capacity Building for Frontline Child Protection Actors
- Integrating Child Safety into Educational Systems
Regional Insights & Scalable Models
- Lessons from Africa: Replicable Models for Low-Resource Settings
- Scaling Child Protection Innovations in Resource-Constrained Environments
- Contextualizing Global Best Practices for Local Impact
AVAILABLE FOR
This body of work spans a diverse range of high-impact platforms, each strategically positioned to influence thought leadership, policy, practice, and innovation in child protection and safeguarding:
- Keynote Addresses serve as powerful anchor moments at major events, where visionary insights, lived experience, and forward-looking strategies are shared to inspire action, shape narratives, and set the tone for critical conversations around child safety, missing children response systems, and systemic reform.
- International Conferences provide a global stage for cross-cultural exchange, bringing together experts, practitioners, policymakers, and innovators. These forums enable the sharing of best practices, emerging trends, and scalable solutions, while fostering collaboration across borders to address complex child protection challenges.
- Government Policy Forums offer a direct avenue to engage with decision-makers and influence legislative and institutional frameworks. Through these platforms, evidence-based recommendations, field insights, and data-driven approaches are presented to strengthen national and regional child protection systems and inform sustainable policy reform.
- NGO and Multilateral Trainings focus on capacity building for organizations working on the frontlines of child protection. These sessions are designed to equip practitioners with practical tools, frameworks, and methodologies to improve prevention, response, and case management, particularly in resource-constrained and high-risk environments.
- Corporate Social Impact Summits engage private sector stakeholders in advancing child safeguarding agendas. By aligning business strategy with social responsibility, these forums explore how corporations can contribute through innovation, funding, technology, and partnerships to strengthen child protection ecosystems.
- Academic Lectures and Workshops bridge research and practice, creating spaces for critical inquiry, knowledge dissemination, and skills development. These engagements contribute to shaping the next generation of professionals while advancing evidence-based approaches within the academic and practitioner communities.
Together, these platforms reflect a comprehensive approach to thought leadership—spanning inspiration, policy influence, capacity building, cross-sector collaboration, and knowledge advancement—all aimed at strengthening systems that protect children and respond effectively to cases of missing and vulnerable children.
