The first step to helping those in need is having a supportive government enforcing small-scale changes. The National Solidarity Program (NSP) located in Afghanistan is the rehabilitation and development program for rural parts of the nation. It has supported the rights and needs of 18 million people and has helped to construct infrastructure, meet basic community needs, administer democracy and save lives.
The NSP is a program working for the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development (MRRD). It has a set budget of $2.6 billion for the years between 2003 and 2016.
The Nangarhar Province has demonstrated resiliency thanks to NSP. Since NSP’s installation in 2003, it has crated 32,000 Community Development Councils (CDCs) within 36 districts of each province in Afghanistan. It has financed 65,000 projects.
In 2013, NSP was known as the largest development program in Afghanistan. Evaluations have proven that NSP advances access to education, basic utilities, health care and counseling, specifically for women. NSP has created a platform for governance, democratic processes and female participation in rural villages.
The program was based on the hopes that villages could improve themselves with two approaches. NSP aimed to create gender-balanced CDCs and to fund villages through family grants. These grants were meant to enhance village projects managed by CDCs along with public input.
More than 250,000 families were provided technical help thanks to 806 CDCs in just four provinces. Effort to improve development has affected 141,050 people.
Some projects underway in the Nangarhar Province include digging wells, creating sewing jobs for women, building sewer drains and constructing buildings for community meetings. One function of the CDC is to take village complaints and design resolutions. Since residents and neighbors to villages find it to be an effective and sustainable practice, they feel safe to make home in the more promising region.
In 2009, there were 275 families in Ghondi-e-Ahmadzai village. There are now 1,200 people living in the village.
The program has increased school attendance and the quality of education for girls. Health institutes have had a rise of child doctors, prenatal visits and curability of preventable disease with thanks to NSP. The program has also managed to increase access to clean water and sanitation.
Funding from World Bank, Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund and Japan Social Development Fund are supporting the program. Haji Zumarai leads the CDC in Ghondi-e-Ahmadzai village. He’s very grateful for the $50,000 grant funding village development efforts since 2009.
Partners of NSP have helped to improve water and sanitation. NSP’s 31 facilitating partners work within CDCs to contrive 86 thousand small-scale reconstruction and development projects. In addition, they maintain rural roads, irrigation, energy supply, health facilities and education.
BRAC is one facilitation partner of MRRD that helps construct infrastructure outside NSP. It builds systems, latrines, irrigation canals, micro-hydroelectric planets, protection walls, roads, bridges and schools.
It’s partnership with NSP is creating a self-sustainable rural Afghanistan. BRAC encourages democracy by helping to supervise and facilitate CDCs in places like Ghondi-e-Ahmadzai. It prioritizes infrastructure capabilities, aids with project overhaul and oversees transparency efforts.
NSP has bettered small-scale efforts for many by focusing on critical and essential needs in rural villages. In Sayed Ahmad Ghazi Village of the Kabul Province, NSP constructed clinics that are saving lives. MRRD granted $50,000 in funding. Local villages helped by producing $14,000.
Under Dr. Mastorah Ahmadi, two women and one man help oversee 50 patients a day. This has benefited 1,400 families. Children are receiving vaccinations and the workers are quickly treating preventable diseases.
Communities continue to prosper with these programs that minimize the hazardous implications of living in rural Afghanistan. Soon rural living will safe and readily sustainable. The Ghondi-e-Ahmadzai village stands as an example of success when community-focused programs like NSP work intricately with members and leaders.
– Katie Groe
Sources: Bakhtar News, World Bank 1, Wadsam, World Bank 2, World Bank 3, BRAC
Photo: Worldbank
Sayana Press: Innovation in Contraception
Safe and effective contraception is one of poverty’s biggest enemies. In fact, it can prevent up to 33 percent of maternal deaths through things like unsafe abortions (which lead to the death of over 50,000 women annually) and too many consecutive pregnancies, which can lead to harm for both mother and child.
As Joy Phumami, Co-chair of the World Health Organization’s Independent Expert Review Group, says, “delaying pregnancy and spacing births enables more young women to complete school, prevents death and disability among many young women and their children, and contributes to economic development.”
It seems like common sense when stated so plainly. However, worldwide, over 200 million women lack access to contraception.
Factors inhibiting access to and use of birth control include everything from lack of education, to lack of proximal availability, to lack of medical professionals available to administer the drugs.
Sayana Press, an injectable form of birth control, provides three months of contraceptive protection and is so simple that the possibility of self-administration is currently being researched. If achieved, this would allow for long-lasting contraception without the need for patients to enter a clinical setting. One study conducted over 12 months showed that 95 percent of women found self-injection to be a convenient option.
Even in its current state, Sayana Press is easy to administer, and doing so requires very little training. Because it lasts for three months at a time, women do not have to meet up with healthcare professionals so frequently that it is a major inconvenience.
How does it work? The popular birth control drug Depo-Provera is delivered using the Uniject injection system, a prefilled, single-dose, disposable, and compact device. Depo-Provera is widely known to be effective, and more than 88 million Uniject systems have been used since 2000 for such purposes as administering the Hepatitis B vaccine to newborns.
Thanks to the innovation and potential of the product, the Sayana Press was showcased in the Innovation Countdown 2030 Report, an initiative led by PATH to increase awareness and investment in technologies designed to improve global health.
PATH, a nonprofit that works to improve global health and save lives, does its work with a focus on accelerating innovation, making the efficiency and effectiveness of the Sayana Press a prime example of a product warranting their support.
PATH’s Sayana Press Pilot Introduction Project, an initiative that began in 2014 and will last until 2016, has brought the product to five countries in Africa and South Asia. If the results are successful, the product will likely be adopted more widely.
Because family planning is so important in the fight against global poverty, the more options there are, and the more widely available they are to those who need them, the better. Sayana Press is being called one of the most exciting innovations in global health today. Part of its beauty lies in its simplicity: a disposable piece of plastic that has the potential to save millions of lives.
– Emily Dieckman
Sources: IC2030, NPR, Science Direct, Path 1, Path 2, Path 3, WHO
Photo: Path
National Solidarity Program Creates Infrastructure in Rural Afghanistan
The first step to helping those in need is having a supportive government enforcing small-scale changes. The National Solidarity Program (NSP) located in Afghanistan is the rehabilitation and development program for rural parts of the nation. It has supported the rights and needs of 18 million people and has helped to construct infrastructure, meet basic community needs, administer democracy and save lives.
The NSP is a program working for the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development (MRRD). It has a set budget of $2.6 billion for the years between 2003 and 2016.
The Nangarhar Province has demonstrated resiliency thanks to NSP. Since NSP’s installation in 2003, it has crated 32,000 Community Development Councils (CDCs) within 36 districts of each province in Afghanistan. It has financed 65,000 projects.
In 2013, NSP was known as the largest development program in Afghanistan. Evaluations have proven that NSP advances access to education, basic utilities, health care and counseling, specifically for women. NSP has created a platform for governance, democratic processes and female participation in rural villages.
The program was based on the hopes that villages could improve themselves with two approaches. NSP aimed to create gender-balanced CDCs and to fund villages through family grants. These grants were meant to enhance village projects managed by CDCs along with public input.
More than 250,000 families were provided technical help thanks to 806 CDCs in just four provinces. Effort to improve development has affected 141,050 people.
Some projects underway in the Nangarhar Province include digging wells, creating sewing jobs for women, building sewer drains and constructing buildings for community meetings. One function of the CDC is to take village complaints and design resolutions. Since residents and neighbors to villages find it to be an effective and sustainable practice, they feel safe to make home in the more promising region.
In 2009, there were 275 families in Ghondi-e-Ahmadzai village. There are now 1,200 people living in the village.
The program has increased school attendance and the quality of education for girls. Health institutes have had a rise of child doctors, prenatal visits and curability of preventable disease with thanks to NSP. The program has also managed to increase access to clean water and sanitation.
Funding from World Bank, Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund and Japan Social Development Fund are supporting the program. Haji Zumarai leads the CDC in Ghondi-e-Ahmadzai village. He’s very grateful for the $50,000 grant funding village development efforts since 2009.
Partners of NSP have helped to improve water and sanitation. NSP’s 31 facilitating partners work within CDCs to contrive 86 thousand small-scale reconstruction and development projects. In addition, they maintain rural roads, irrigation, energy supply, health facilities and education.
BRAC is one facilitation partner of MRRD that helps construct infrastructure outside NSP. It builds systems, latrines, irrigation canals, micro-hydroelectric planets, protection walls, roads, bridges and schools.
It’s partnership with NSP is creating a self-sustainable rural Afghanistan. BRAC encourages democracy by helping to supervise and facilitate CDCs in places like Ghondi-e-Ahmadzai. It prioritizes infrastructure capabilities, aids with project overhaul and oversees transparency efforts.
NSP has bettered small-scale efforts for many by focusing on critical and essential needs in rural villages. In Sayed Ahmad Ghazi Village of the Kabul Province, NSP constructed clinics that are saving lives. MRRD granted $50,000 in funding. Local villages helped by producing $14,000.
Under Dr. Mastorah Ahmadi, two women and one man help oversee 50 patients a day. This has benefited 1,400 families. Children are receiving vaccinations and the workers are quickly treating preventable diseases.
Communities continue to prosper with these programs that minimize the hazardous implications of living in rural Afghanistan. Soon rural living will safe and readily sustainable. The Ghondi-e-Ahmadzai village stands as an example of success when community-focused programs like NSP work intricately with members and leaders.
– Katie Groe
Sources: Bakhtar News, World Bank 1, Wadsam, World Bank 2, World Bank 3, BRAC
Photo: Worldbank
How Poverty Can Stunt Brain Development in Children
According to a study published earlier this month in JAMA Pediatrics, children who grow up in poverty can be more likely to experience stunted brain development.
Low test scores and poor social interaction at school have been linked to poverty at home in the past, but these findings help provide scientific evidence for the correlation.
The study states that children living below the poverty line demonstrated “systematic structural differences” in their brains when compared to non-poor children.
The study was conducted by researchers from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Duke University. Tracking around 400 children and young adults between 2001 and 2007, the researchers took a brain scan of the participants every two years. These scans measured the consistency of gray matter in areas of the brain linked to good academic performance.
“It’s only in the last few years that there’s been any systematic research asking about the biological side of the story,” said John Gabrieli, an MIT neuroscientist who’s published similar studies linking poverty with brain development. “We have so much very strong evidence that there’s lots of room for brain plasticity all the way through adulthood.”
The “environmental circumstances of poverty,” as the study puts it, are most likely one the largest factors in limiting children’s brain development. These factors consist of practices and items that help stimulate brain growth, such as books, coloring items, a comfortable bed to sleep in, and someone to read to you.
While not the first study to link poverty with brain development, the JAMA Pediactrics study is the first to fully connect its results. Hopefully this study will open more doors for further research to be conducted on this subject and more progress can be made.
– Alexander Jones
Sources: Huffington Post, Mother Jones, Star Tribune
Photo: Huffington Post
Tilapiana Helps Fish Farmers out of Poverty
Scientists predict fish such as tilapia will become extinct in 30 to 40 years due to non-sustainable fishing methods. Because of this, marine stock is over-exploited by 80 percent. Tilapiana, an organization dedicated to ending poverty in fishing communities, works to provide these communities funds, resources and training to maintain the fishing industry.
Billions of people living in developing communities rely on fishing for their livelihood and sustenance. With the challenges associated with the fishing industry, fish farmers face many difficulties that either prevent them from fishing or destroys their farm altogether. Fish is the primary source of protein in many developing communities based in coastal regions, and the availability of fish has decreased in recent years due to negative effects on the environment, causing poverty to increase.
Tilapiana, which is based out of Utah, was started in 2010 by Justin King and Andrew Stewart, with the goal of providing resources to those living at the base of the pyramid-those who live with the least financial, environmental and social sustainability. Tiapiana uses business models to help fish farms make up for the lack of sustainability with their position in the fishing industry. They have created the Tilapiana Fish Farm, which trains and empowers entrepreneurs to sustain their business and help bridge the nutritional gap many face.
Tilapiana Fish Farms follow a traditional franchise model. They provide fish farmers with the tools, supplies and resources needed to successfully run a fish farm. This initiative, Profit in a Pond, has successfully helped many farmers escape poverty, transcend the fishing industry and provide a healthy life for them and their families.
King and Stewart base their efforts in communities in Africa, primarily in Ghana. After graduating from Brigham Young University with an MBA in social environment, King decided to apply his degree to helping end poverty around the world, concluding the best way to do so was to help alleviate fish farmers in developing communities.
Recently, the organization was rated by Matador Network as one of the top 50 nonprofit organizations making a difference. In an interview with The Digital Universe, the founders of Tilapiana spoke about the startup of the company, saying it took several months of meeting with business leaders, being trained by fish farmers in effective fishing techniques and building relationships with citizens in Ghana.
– Julia Hettiger
Sources: BYU, Tilapiana, Deseret News
Photo: Flickr
The SunSaluter: A One-Stop Shop For Power and Water
Eden Full was 19-years-old when she dropped out of Princeton University to turn her high school science project into a global technology innovation. She created the SunSaluter, a solar panel rotator designed to collect energy and produce four liters of clean drinking water at the same time.
The SunSaluter is a low-cost solar panel placed on a single axis that rotates towards the sun. The solar panel is mounted on a rotating frame, with a weight suspended from one end, and a specially designed water clock suspended on the other. As the sun rises, the water clock is heated, which forces the water to empty through a purifier and into a container. This process produces four liters of clean drinking water each day.
The rotation is a passive movement that increases the efficiency of the solar panels by 30 percent. The SunSaluter is built using low-tech tools and materials, making it a perfect fit for the developing world.
Not only does the SunSaluter produce more energy that most solar panels because of it’s rotation, it also saves time and energy for those who use it, who otherwise would spend time collecting wood or spending money on gas and electricity. It provides families with electricity and clean water, providing them with resources they did not previously have access.
In 2012, Full installed the first SunSaluters in Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania. In an interview with Triple Pundit, she explains the value of the simplicity of the SunSaltuer. “A lot of the people, mostly women, who gather the water and who would be maintaining these devices, have never gone to school. So it’s very important to actually go out into the field to figure out what kind of technology is needed to match that lifestyle.”
However, the SunSaluter is still a work in progress. Full is working on a business strategy to fund the production, as well as to maximize the efficiency of the product itself. Full is bright and determined, and is pushing for success of the SunSaluter.
– Hannah Resnick
Sources: Business Insider, Clean Technica, SunSaluter, Triple Pundit
Photo: Flickr
The Power of Touch: A New Method to End Poverty
A simple, nonsexual, touch can make a huge difference in the people around us. Through our five senses of sight, smell, hearing, taste and touch we perceive the world around us. In our current world, we rely mostly on our eyes and ears and we base our opinions and focus on the information we hear and the sights we see. However, touch is also as vital to our everyday lives because even the slightest touch can influence the way we think and act.
In a recent article by Spring, a Psychology blog, they discussed the different types of touch that can influence behavior. There is the money touch, such as a well-timed touch on a patron’s arm by a waitress, which has been shown to encourage a bigger tip. Another is the compliance touch, where a light touch on the upper arm extended a broader range of compliance out of the receiver.
The article discussed many different types, but one that needed closer examination was the touch for help. In a study, strangers who were touched lightly on the arm when asked for help were more likely to help with a variety of tasks than those who were not. In fact, the percentage of those who helped went from 63 percent when they were not touched on the arm to 90 percent when they were touched.
If something as simple as a light touch could provide such a drastic change in the results of individuals, think of the potential applications it could have with helping those in poverty.
Many poverty-stricken people within the United States beg on the streets, and organizations that try to help them usually have little success trying to make change, whether that be political, social or economic. If both could involve slight well-timed touches into their appeals to pedestrians, think of the amount of change that could potentially occur.
Although the direct causes of poverty have been generally seen as a topic of debate, it is a fact that those subjected to poverty have higher rates of depression and other illnesses. It has also been medically proven that the power of touch can help alleviate the stresses of depression and help show support to those in need.
If we were to focus some efforts on using the power of touch and spending time being a little more compassionate to those in need, it’s possible that change to the state of poverty could be made.
– Alysha Biemolt
Sources: Spring, Nicolas Gueguen, Gallup, The Borgen Project, Fast Coexist, Prevention
Photo: Flickr
Why Does Only 2.7% of Foreign Aid Go Towards Higher Education?
Between 2002 and 2013, developed nations invested an estimated $42.6 billion into the growth of higher education programs within developing countries. While this figure alone appears staggering in size, one must also consider the $1.6 trillion in total foreign aid these developed nations invested during the same time period. With investments in higher education responsible for only 2.7 percent of the international development budget, many are now questioning the causes of this disparity.
The United States itself invests approximately three percent of its total foreign aid budget into higher education, which is less than half of the other average contributions made by other donor countries. Many have questioned how a centrally developed nation has failed to deliver the necessary support for tertiary education programs in regions that would clearly benefit from such initiatives.
The roots of this problem may very well date back to the 1980s when the World Bank conducted a series of studies regarding the efficacy of educational programs.
The studies argued that financial investments within primary education programs resulted in double the amount of social capital for youth populations as opposed to investments within tertiary education programs. The findings also included suggestions that the benefits of a youth pursuing further education after secondary school proved substantially higher for the individual as opposed to their nation as a whole.
As a result, the global community prioritized the development of primary education systems and even focused Millennium Development Goal 2 on achieving universal primary education.
Conflicting with many of the beliefs about education adopted in the 1980s, numerous studies conducted in the past fifteen years have challenged many of the conclusions drawn by the World Bank studies.
The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) released a report in 2008, which instead argued that tertiary education is a vital asset to the global community as it encourages social and economic developments through the strengthening of a populations knowledge bases the creation of human capital and the application and dissemination of such knowledge.
A disparaging and growing cycle of educational failures within developing regions has also been found to be in part caused by a lack of growth within higher education. Researchers have argued that without access to strong higher education programs, the inability to train essential officials such as teachers, economic managers and political leaders, who are responsible for ensuring certain standards for the quality of education are reached, will continue to persist.
In recent years, many of the most highly motivated and qualified academic individuals within developing regions such as sub-Saharan Africa have emigrated to higher education facilities in the Western hemisphere. This mass exodus of the most talented minds has caused notable corrosion in the academic climates of universities in developing regions, facilities that are often overwrought with insufficient funding and corrupt governmental proceedings.
Government leaders of both developed and developing nations must cooperatively address the issue of increasing levels of funding for higher education programs within impoverished and underdeveloped regions. While the global community has demonstrated strong dedication in pursuing the achievement of Millennium Development Goal 2, attention must now be turned to the pursuit of universal higher education.
– James Thornton
Sources: The Conversation, Vanderbilt
Photo: Flickr
Ireland: Closer to International Development Aid Target
Countries around the world have been revamping their anti-poverty efforts in preparation for the establishment of new Sustainable Development Goals in September. Although Ireland has not yet met its target of allocating 0.7% of Gross National Product, or GNP, to overseas development aid, it is making improvements.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Charlie Flanagan recently stated his confidence in Ireland’s aid program. In fact, at the launch of the Irish Aid annual report for 2014, he described the program as one of the most effective in the world during tough economic years. He believes that the 0.7 percent target will soon be reached.
The report revealed that Ireland provided more than 85 million Euros in humanitarian assistance and 269 tons of critical humanitarian supplies like blankets and tents in 2014. Flanagan boasted of the Irish people’s engagement with development assistance, saying that they take pride in the collective Irish effort.
According to Flanagan, Ireland’s overseas aid program is lifting millions of people out of poverty and hunger. In order to evidence this claim, he broke down the program’s contributions to its Key Partner Countries—Ethiopia and Mozambique.
Flanagan pointed out that the program has worked to reduce the number of mothers dying during childbirth. In Ethiopia specifically, support for maternal health services for poor women contributed to a 70 percent reduction in deaths during childbirth.
In terms of education, support for training and recruiting teachers has helped to increase the number of girls enrolled in school. In fact, in Mozambique, the development program’s assistance contributed to a nine percent increase in the enrollment of girls in school.
Minister of State for Development Seán Sherlock has pointed out that 2014 was a year of unprecedented levels of humanitarian crises worldwide. He stressed the effectiveness and efficiency of Ireland’s response to such crises, and maintained a confident, yet realistic outlook on the program’s ability to respond similarly in the future.
As just one example, Sherlock claims to have personally witnessed the impact of roughly 18 million Euros in funding provided to Sierra Leone and Liberia during the Ebola crisis. This is the type of crisis that no one could possibly have planned for, and yet Ireland rose to the occasion, paving the way for other contributors during crisis.
Sherlock provided additional evidence for the effectiveness of the Irish Aid program by pointing to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s, or OECD, review. According to Sherlock, the OECD concluded—through thorough assessment—that the Irish Aid program was one of the most effective of its kind worldwide.
Sherlock echoed Flanagan’s re-commitment to reaching the 0.7 percent target, but he confessed candidly that this goal will not be reached in 2015. To clarify, this does not mean that Ireland is not on the right track, or that it has not carried its weight thus far in terms of the anti-poverty and sustainable development effort.
Both Sherlock and Flanagan have reassured the general public that with time, Ireland will proudly allocate 0.7 percent or more of GNP to overseas development aid. Until that time comes, the Irish Aid program will continue to combat poverty and improve the lives of the world’s most suffering people.
– Sarah Bernard
Sources: Irish Times, Irish Mirror, Irish Examiner
Photo: Flickr
5 Possible Changes to Bring a New Era of Reproductive Health
Only governments can ensure that Universal Health Coverage (UHC) is achieved within their nations. While it is widely regarded to be making strides with reproductive health services, it is important to take note of the following changes to ensure so that new era of services can emerge:
1. Domestic Financing
The Universal Health Coverage goal allows everyone access to health services regardless of financial hardship. Pursuing this goal often leads to dramatic health financing reforms, but the key is to give rise to national insurance initiatives that allow health budgets to be spent on strategic purchasing of health services, rather than on keeping the doors open at public facilities alone.
2. Cost-effective Service Package
Few services are as cost-effective for both health and economic development as contraception. Thus, contraception must be prioritized for universal access. It would be imperative to place importance on measurable health outcomes, or possibly the Sustainable Development Goals.
3. Making UHC Work in the Low-Level Private Sector
Lower-level private facilities, which are often a lifeline to communities, should not be forgotten in public financing reforms. This will prevent a wider spread of coverage to communities that need the types of services that accompany the lower-level private facilities.
4. Advocating Financing by Doing
In countries that have not taken strides with the UHC, organizations can still contribute to progress through proof-of-concept financial projects like large-scale voucher programs to remove financial barriers. All types of health providers (faith-based, for-profit or public) need to be quality-assured for the services they offer.
5. Disrupting the Status Quo
Youth, women, tech-savvy entrepreneurs, health workers, civil society and the private sector will all be the influencers to drive change within family panning over the next 15 years. It is important to welcome new voices to the debates and meetings of importance. Frankness will be key to change, by dropping euphemisms and vague terms there will less trickery and more discussion of the topics that need to be discussed. Even the term “family planning” was created to avoid the associated taboo of the world’s abortion and contraception.
Investment in the health, education and rights of young people, and the alignment of related policies, is critical as it enables productivity and economic growth and the better spread and knowledge of reproductive health services is key to that.
– Alysha Biemolt
Sources: AllAfrica, Impatient Optimists, World Bank
Photo: myScience.org
Education Crisis for Pakistan’s Internally Displaced Persons
As of 2015, there have been approximately 700,000 internally displaced persons in the volatile North Waziristan region of Pakistan as a consequence of Taliban insurgency. Of these 700,000, around 300,000 are children of a school-going age range. For these children, a stable education remains a dream.
In late 2009, militant threats in the northwestern tribal areas of North Waziristan escalated dramatically. After various military offensives against militants in the surrounding regions of South Waziristan and Swat, the Pakistani army launched Operation Zarb-e-Azb in January 2014. The military has since been conducting an extensive yet lengthy military operation against the Taliban militants in North Waziristan.
The increasingly dangerous circumstances in the Taliban stronghold has led to a mass exodus of the region’s residents. This military intervention, despite its exigent need, has created significant issues for the displaced people as well as the Pakistani government. The already financially-crippled Pakistani government is thus faced with the immense challenge of providing relief for the refugees.
The refugees from Northern Waziristan add to the almost 1 million refugees who have been displaced during the war on terrorism in the country. The cost of providing basic healthcare and resources to the refugees has been allotted $1 million from the Pakistani government, with substantial bolstering from the United States and China.
Despite the funding, the conditions in the refugee camps are less than satisfactory. As the provision of shelter and food becomes an issue, the educational needs of refugee children have taken a backseat. Temporary schools established for refugee children are in abysmal conditions and are impossibly short-staffed. Many parents are told to enroll their children in far-off government schools. However, many government-run schools are being used as temporary shelters, and not as schools.
According to UNHCR, of the 300,000 children in refugee camps, only 5% are enrolled in schools, whether public, private or NGO-run. Many students old enough to work are choosing menial jobs over continuing their education so as to financially support their families.
Prior to the refugee crisis, the literacy rates in the Northern Waziristan district were only 16% overall and a deplorable 1.67% for girls. The increased presence of fundamentalists in the region who target schools—and, specifically, female education—has adversely affected the state of education in the region.
Unfortunately, for the families returning home this summer, the conditions for education have not improved. Many of the schools have been destroyed through the course of the clashes between the army and the Taliban; others are still occupied by the army as temporary bases. As schools across the country reopen in September, students in North Waziristan continue to face an uncertain, unstable future.
The government has so far failed to come up with a successful and effective plan for the rehabilitation of these students. Recently, the higher education commission announced a stipend of Rs. 2,000 for every student enrolled in post-secondary education; however, no such plan has been revealed for the elementary, middle or high school students.
The director of education for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA)—the education authority for North Waziristan—has suggested that UNICEF aid be used to establish schools in tents for IDPs who continue to reside in the camps. Additionally, the director has recommended a second shift for schools in neighboring areas, like Bannu and Lakki Marwat, specifically for IDPs. The feasibility and potential for success of both these measures have been met with criticism and apprehension from many nonprofit agencies, as well as the refugees themselves.
As the government deadline for the complete return of North Waziristan IDPs to their homes—set for January 2016—fast approaches, it is imperative that the educational authorities within the government focus on the rehabilitation of these students. The Pakistani government, with assistance from its aides, needs to make education in the region a priority in its budget. The goal of the provincial government should not be pre-2009, but to bring the region to a literacy rate at least on par with the rest of the country, especially for girls. An effective strategy and delegation of resources to educate the children of North Waziristan are crucial to the long-term stability of the region.
– Atifah Safi
Sources: UNHCR, FATA Disaster Management Authority, Aljazeera, Aljazeera, Dawn, Pakistan Today
Photo: Flickr