Archive for category: Children

Information and stories addressing children.

, , , , , ,

The Reality of Child Poverty in Haiti

Child poverty in Haiti
Haiti, a small country that borders the Dominican Republic on the Hispaniola island, suffers greatly from poverty. Natural disasters, systemic inequality and diminishing economic opportunities create a dire state of extreme poverty. Specifically, child poverty in Haiti is the major poverty crisis.

More than half of Haiti’s 11.2 million population live on less than $3 a day, and malnutrition affects 65,000 children under 5 years old. Many children under 14 — more than a third of Haiti’s population — do not have ready access to health care, clean water, food security or the right to fair and decent work. The question stands: What does child poverty in Haiti look like today, and what obstacles persist in ending it?

It is easy to forget that statistics reflect the experience of real, living people. Please keep this in mind. Considering this, here are five facts about child poverty in Haiti.

The Statistical Perspective

  1.  Malnutrition: Caloric and nutritive malnutrition affect nearly a third of children in Haiti. Out of every five children, one child is malnourished and one out of 10 is acutely malnourished. Before the age of five, one child out of 14 will die. Those who live deal with the effects of inadequate food supplies. Poor access to vital nutrients means that children are subject to poor health, growth and development.
  2. Education: Despite Haiti’s free publication education, only half of the elementary-aged children are enrolled in school. Millions of disadvantaged parents have very few with little resources to secure education for their children. This is a result of Haiti privatizing 92% of schools.
  3.  Labor and Human Trafficking: Nearly half a million children are orphans in Haiti. A significant proportion of these “lost” children experience exploitation for labor in dangerous conditions. “Host households” take in children whose families cannot provide for them. Many of these children — known colloquially as “restaveks” — end up as victims of human trafficking.
  4.  Health Care: Adequate health care is hard to come by in Haiti. Child immunization has stagnated at 41%. The proportion of children who die before their first birthday has risen by 2% in the last year – from 57% to 59%. HIV, tuberculosis and a variety of other chronic, crippling diseases ail an estimated 20,000 children in Haiti, and treatment is increasingly difficult to obtain.

COVID-19

Haiti is particularly prone to natural disasters, in large part due to its geographical situation in Bermuda. A magnitude 7.0 earthquake ravaged the island of Hispaniola in 2010. A slew of tropical storms, hurricanes and additional earthquakes further compromised Haiti. Nearly 10 years later, Haiti still struggles with recovering from its 2010 earthquake and hurricane Matthew alongside dealing with recent social unrest and COVID-19.

Humanitarian aid efforts are nearing an all-time high for the country, but the efficacy of these programs and endeavors has been questioned. The threats of COVID-19 are not the only ones Haiti must face. The future is increasingly uncertain for millions of Haitians and their children, due to equipment shortages, lack of qualified health care professionals and a worsening economic climate.

Solutions

UNICEF has been implementing relief efforts to provide aid in the aftermath of earthquakes. Additionally, it has helped improve sanitation, nutrition and health care for children. However, if one would like to aid Haiti themselves, for free, they can create momentum on social media to raise awareness about the dire situation in Haiti. A number of ways exist to combat child poverty in Haiti; it just takes action.

– Henry Comes-Pritchett
Photo: Flickr

, , , , ,

Open Heart Orphanage Suffers During the Pandemic

Open Heart OrphanageIn the midst of COVID-19 sweeping through Uganda, six children at Open Heart Orphanage have died. However, it was not the virus that claimed their lives. The tragic deaths were a result of hunger and fever, collateral effects of the pandemic.

Food Struggles During the Pandemic

The people of Uganda must fight to stay healthy during the pandemic as well as combat food insecurity. The issue of food affordability is not only an organic result of the pandemic. Back in April, four Ugandan government officials were arrested for conspiring to inflate COVID-19 relief food prices. The effects are far-reaching. According to UNICEF, 6.7 million children under the age of five could suffer from life-threatening malnutrition in 2020.

The Hidden Victims

Uganda has consistently ranked among the countries with the greatest number of orphaned children in the world, and it has not gone without its controversy. Last year, VICE reported that there are at least 300 “children’s homes” operating without government oversight. Four out of five of these orphans have at least one living parent. Questions arise over the exploitation of these children and the quality of the care they receive. During the coronavirus pandemic, the children are even more vulnerable. Orphans are oftentimes the faces of Facebook scams targeting donors from Western countries.

Children are the “hidden victims” of the virus. They are not particularly susceptible to contracting the disease, but they will be the ones to bear its effects on the social and economic systems. Domestic struggles within the family, surging food prices and a shortage of available medical care have led to malnutrition and displacement, especially in developing countries like Uganda. The result is many children are being left in orphanages.

Open Heart Orphanage

The Borgen Project interviewed Hassan Mubiru, a pastor at Open Heart Orphanage in Bulenga, Kampala, Uganda. Its mission is to help orphans experience a full and productive life. Currently, the organization serves 175 “needy” or orphaned children. The Christian nonprofit aims to provide these children with education, medical assistance, housing, clothing, food and water and the love of God. Due to the pandemic, there have been some obstacles in achieving these goals.

“Coronavirus has crippled most of our activities because we were absolutely unprepared when the lockdown was announced,” said Mubiru. The pastor explains that the organization has always worked below its budget and did not store supplies ahead of time. When COVID-19 hit, they did not have enough resources to sustain themselves.

Even more challenging was the shortage of volunteers. Mubiru stated, “Those who used to individually help are no longer helping. We cannot guarantee salary or their payments.” Unstable payments met with mandates to stay in quarantine have deterred many volunteers from coming to Open Heart Orphanage.

Mubiru says that the biggest issue for Open Heart Orphanage is the lack of available food. “It is extremely difficult or impossible to get food as prices went higher and almost nothing was coming into us. We have so far lost six children due to hunger and fever since the pandemic started. These are things we would have prevented if we had enough food and means of getting treatment in time.”

Open Heart Orphanage strives to help children reach their fullest potential. The nonprofit is a stepping stone for the children and not a final destination. Mubiru believes that children are better off in a home than an orphanage, especially in these times. Mubiru emphasized, “We encourage families to adopt even if this is another crisis because the law governing adoption is tough and high fees.”

– Miska Salemann
Photo: Flickr

, , ,

Poverty in the UK Fought Through Film

The United Kingdom is known for being a popular city for tourists with sites, such as Big Ben, the London Eye and Buckingham Palace. However, what may not be as well-known is the fact that the UK struggles with a significant class difference. It has an ever-widening gap between the poor and the affluent, which leads to high rates of poverty in the UK, specifically for children.

Child Poverty

Child poverty is one of the most notable effects of overall poverty in the UK. This poverty crisis struck Britain hard in 1999. Its child poverty proportion became the highest out of all of the western European countries.

In 2016-17, poverty impacted nearly 30% of children — 4.1 million — in the UK. In the following year — 2018-19, the number of children in poverty in the UK increased by 100,000. The trend is on an upward spike rather than its 2003 downward rate when child poverty was made a priority. Poverty in the UK needs to be addressed, especially among the youth. It leads to increased hardships in life from education to mental and physical health to employment and so much more.

Use of the Film Industry

Films produce major results in ending poverty. The film industry has positively impacted poverty in the UK in many ways. For one, the film industry creates many job opportunities. In 2009, the core UK film industry created or impacted nearly 100,000 jobs relating to film production, sales and tourism. Furthermore, portrayals of the UK in films contribute heavily to tourism and yearly account for about £1.9 billion. That brings the total UK film industry contribution in 2009 to raising the GDP by more than £4.5 billion.

The improved economy can be a promising solution for aiding the UK’s children out of poverty. The country can use the funds to help out the struggling citizens, focusing specifically on the poor. In this way, films pose as a promising solution for poverty aid in other countries as well.

“Poor Kids”

The amount of money and the impact the film industry has on the UK is astounding and a promising solution for poverty. However, the impact one film made for children in poverty is even more remarkable.

The film, “Poor Kids,” has made great strides toward improving the lives of impoverished UK children. The film illustrates the living situations of three families in poverty through the lens of the children. Courtney (age 8), Paige (age 10) and Sam (age 11) give detailed and heart-wrenching accounts of their experiences growing up in poverty. The film received much acclaim. It was a Broadcast Best Documentary Nominee, a Learning on Screen Nominee, a Televisual Bulldog Best Documentary Nominee and received the Chicago Film Festival Gold Plaque for Social and Political Documentary in 2012.

Films awards aside, “Poor Kids” sparked change in the community. Make Lunch is a program that began after Poor Kids debuted as a direct result of the film. The program contributes free meals to children during the times when school is not in session and when children could potentially go for a long period without food. In the summer of 2012, as many as 13 lunch kitchens were providing the free lunches.

And That’s A Wrap

The effects of poverty in the UK are prevalent, notably in the large number of impoverished children. The worsening situation provides a sense of sorrow to the country, but a solution presents itself. Films not only contribute to the wealth of a country, but they provide jobs as well. Both of these aspects could be potential resources to utilize when fighting poverty.

Additionally, films bring about emotion, and that creates change. The inspiration that “Poor Kids” ignited contributed to a charity that helps the children in poverty. With results, such as the Make Lunch program, films can yield great benefits for poverty in the UK and the world.

– Hailee Shores
Photo: Flickr

, , ,

Links Between South African Poverty and Education

South African poverty and educationSouth Africa is a country with 19.6 million children, making up about 35% of its total population of 56.5 million people. Of these 19.6 million children, about 98% have “attended some form of an educational facility.” However, these high attendance rates do not mean high-quality education and lack of academic resources is a large contributing factor to the correlation between South African poverty and education.

Education in South Africa

Despite having high rates of education enrollment, the quality of education in South Africa is poor. Reports have shown that of the students who attended school for five years, only half can do basic math. Furthermore, there are little to no standards for the teachers to be held at. About 10% of teachers across the country are absent from school on any given day and 79% of grade six math teachers do not have the content knowledge to be teaching at their respective level.

Education is compulsory until grade nine, and over the years, there have been increasing numbers of drop-out students, for a variety of reasons. The main reason is unequal access to resources as a result of poverty. The disparities between female and male students also continually present issues in the South African education system, especially with low percentages of girls pursuing careers in science, math or technology.

In addition, South African schools have struggled to teach basic skills such as reading and writing as well as early development for young children. Only 38.4% of children ages zero to four attended a school system such as day-care, playgroup or pre-kindergarten programs. The early development issue is further seen as 46.8% of parents say they do not read with their children and 43.15% say that they do not color or draw with their children.

South African Poverty and Education Correlation

South Africa has struggled with high rates of poverty for many years and the correlation between South African poverty and education is present in many different aspects of the relationship. In rural areas in the former homelands, about 81% of children are below the poverty line and 44% of children in urban areas live in poverty as well. Education in rural areas suffers especially, simply as a result of the barriers presented by the location. For example, critical resources such as water, electricity, books and technology are missing from many schools, which present obstacles for South African children to have a complete educational experience. Furthermore, the location of schools in comparison to students’ homes, present long commutes. Without reliable transportation, students and teachers both struggle to consistently arrive at school.

Why Low Education Enables Poverty

Poor education is a leading factor in continuing the cycle of poverty. Research continually supports the idea that children who suffer from high rates of poverty are more likely to drop out of school after grade nine as a result of the barriers poverty creates. Increasing the quality of education results in a growing economy, lowers income inequalities and decreases the risk of disease and violence. Without a basic education, South African children struggle to become members of the workforce, and as a result, cannot escape poverty. Education not only teaches basic skills such as reading and writing but helps to develop important qualities such as strong communication and social skills. Without this, it is difficult for children to become working members of society. Furthermore, education differences between the poor and the rich as well as males and females, increases inequality, resulting in poor systems that cannot fix the underlying issues.

Partners for Possibility

Partners for Possibility is an example of a grassroots organization that works to fix the issues between South African poverty and education all while improving businesses in the United States. Business leaders from companies in the United States go overseas to South Africa for a 12-month program in which they teach principals and leaders of schools about leadership and engagement. By doing so, business professionals help to change the unstable and ineffective system of South African education, while simultaneously learning about poverty and culture in South Africa. The program has had extremely positive outcomes as education leaders, teachers and parents become more invested and engaged in the school system, which in turn, benefits the children.

South African poverty and education are strongly linked and this presents many issues for children. However, it is not an impossible mission to address and Partners for Possibility demonstrates the mutual return for U.S. businesses and South Africans that comes with finding these solutions.

– Alyssa Hogan
Photo: Flickr

,

3 NGOs Dedicated to Ending Child Poverty in Mongolia

Child Poverty in Mongolia
According to the World Bank, “two in five poor people in Mongolia are children under the age of 15.” However, many organizations are working to combat the effects of child poverty in Mongolia. Among the different NGOs making direct efforts to help children in Mongolia, three are making significant strides in changing the lives of as many vulnerable young people as possible. Below are the three NGOs tackling child poverty in Mongolia.

3 NGOs Dedicated to Ending Child Poverty in Mongolia

  1. The Lotus Children’s Centre – For the past 25 years, the Lotus Children’s Centre has been caring for children who were abused and abandoned. Didi Ananda Kalika founded the Lotus Children’s Centre and it is currently located in Gachuurt. Around 65-75 children call the center home, receiving vital necessities such as nutrition, health care and education. The center strives to provide children with the tools they need in order to escape the cycle of poverty in adulthood and thrive as healthy individuals. Even after the children leave the center, the organization continues to support their needs through education and career opportunities.
  2. Flourishing Future Mongolia – Observing the painful reality of families losing their children to the streets due to poverty, Aase Sims, Susan Griffeth, Ruthild Beck, Nergui Purevsuren and Oyunbat created the Flourishing Future Community Center in 2001 in the slums of a ger district. The organization has continuously focused on supporting marginalized families and their children in Mongolia. Flourishing Future focuses on providing scholarships, meals, education and medical care, and partnering with the local girls’ shelter and the local orphanage. With the help of international donors, 36 students received scholarships in 2016-2017 to further their education and pursue their career goals. Flourishing Future advocates for educating not only children going into first grade but also for adults who need vocational training and English training. The organization distributes food with the condition that the children in the family must be attending school. Furthermore, they support the local orphanage by not only providing English lessons and outings but also running a yearly summer camp for the children. In addition to providing food twice a month to families who qualify for the program, the NGO also helps families stay warm by providing them with firewood.
  3. Asral – When the Soviet Union collapsed, many families who lost their homes migrated to Ulaanbaatar. In 2001, Venerable Panchen Otrul Rinpoche founded Asral in order to provide support to families so that no more children would be abandoned on the streets. With the help of the community and local leaders, the NGO provides education, food and daily needs for the children from marginalized families. The Hot Meal Project is one of the main projects that directly help impoverished children in Mongolia. The Hot Meal project supports 30 children from the most impoverished families by providing daily meals, health care, financial needs, clothes and other basic needs.

Looking Ahead

The Lotus Children’s Centre, Flourishing Future Mongolia and Asral are working every day to protect the lives of children and their families. With the assistance of the NGOs, children in Mongolia are able to stay with their families. By directly helping these families, the NGOs are changing lives in a positive way.

– Hakyung Kim
Photo: Pixabay

,

Aberdeenshire Addresses Child Poverty Problems

Aberdeenshire Addresses Child Poverty Problems

On September 8, 2020, Aberdeenshire City Council addressed their growing child poverty problem and created a plan of action.

About Aberdeenshire

Aberdeenshire sits on the northeast coast of Scotland, with a population of 458,000.  Known for being the home of Marischal College, the city is located approximately 120 miles north of the nation’s capital, Edinburgh. Aberdeenshire is Europe’s oil capital, supplying most of its population with work in the oil and gas sectors. Aberdeenshire is also called Aberdeen, due to its city being part of the historic country. However, Aberdeen holds a different independent council area that is within Aberdeenshire’s council.

Child Poverty in Aberdeenshire

In February 2020, the Aberdeenshire council announced that approximately 8,000 children were living in poverty. This rising number directly correlates to the rising number of COVID-19 cases in the city and around the world. Aberdeenshire Council’s communities committee announced the citizens’ universal credit claims have risen to 75% since the pandemic started. This issue is not unfamiliar to this region, as more than 4 million children live in poverty in the United Kingdom alone.

Due to the closing of many businesses, there has also been a reduction in job availability and employment opportunities because of the limited number of vacant positions. Since the beginning of the pandemic, unemployment in Aberdeenshire has increased from 12.9% to 14%. The lack of job opportunities and the number of credit scores rising all contribute to Aberdeenshire’s citizens being unable to afford the increasingly higher costs of living.

Unaffordable living is a leading cause of child poverty. Instability in their housing often causes children to move schools and thus inhibit their continuous education. Children with unstable living conditions are far more likely not to finish their education and therefore have no way to escape poverty. In 2016, an Urban Wire Institution research project found that increasing household stability could reduce child poverty by almost 21%. The Aberdeenshire City Council addressed these numbers in a meeting on February 11th.

During the meeting, the Committee also mentioned that child poverty numbers were much higher in Aberdeenshire than in soundings cities. There are around 1,239 children living in poverty in Kincardine and Mearns since the virus, which is a vast difference from Aberdeenshire. Evidence suggests that these numbers are not getting any smaller. Scotland’s Poverty and Inequality Commission and Children’s Commissioner warned that child poverty rates could potentially “rocket.”

Action by the Council

The vast differences in child poverty encouraged councillors to take action to reduce the Aberdeenshire child poverty problem. On September 8, the council made the first concrete steps to create a child poverty reduction plan. In addition, the elected members decided to focus on the root cause of child poverty to address the problem on a more fundamental level. This plan creates and finds affordable living situations for Aberdeenshire citizens, therefore attempting to solve the issue of childhood instability and in turn promote an education that enables children to escape poverty. The city plans on combatting child poverty by helping its citizens make the most of their income and build people’s capabilities. While this could be difficult due to the ongoing pandemic, Aberdeenshire plans to boost employability and promote better choices for its residents.

Anne Stirling, Aberdeenshire Committee Chairwoman, said she’s happy to finally create programs that will “help people to maximize their income and get the support they require in terms of retraining.”

– Mackenzie Reese
Photo: Flickr

, , ,

Ekal Vidyalaya Focuses on Education and Indian Children

Education and Indian ChildrenOver 100,000 schools and just as many teachers deliver education in even the most traditionally unreachable, rural parts of India because of one foundation. Ekal Vidyalaya, a nonprofit originally inspired by social research and activism, recognizes the paramount goal of establishing educational access for every child in rural India and approaches it directly. Inspired and built in the 1980s, Ekal Vidyalaya conducts multinational fundraising, transforms nontraditional school models into working solutions and impacts the lives of nearly 2.8 million students through its efforts. Bringing education and Indian children without teachers and schools together is a fundamental pillar of the Ekal mission, which transcends borders in an impassioned quest to substantively create change.

Ekal Vidyalaya: Mission and History

Ekal Vidyalaya’s mission is to raise up schools and rural communities with “basic education, digital literacy, skill development, health awareness and rural entrepreneurship” in unison with farming maximization efforts that are taught. These wide-ranging, self-identified aspects of the organization’s mission reflect some of the initial issues that Ekal Vidyalaya, even before it was known as such, identified. Dr. Rakesh Kumar Popli and Dr. Rajneesh Arora, among others who were analytically evaluating regions in India in order to determine areas of concern, partnered with other leading scientists and activists of the time in order to raise awareness towards educational discrepancies and other health and social issues. Over time, education and Indian children became focal points of an effort that became known as Ekal Vidyalaya and refining steps brought the ancillary and primary systems of aid into reality.

Ekal Vidyalaya’s Methodology and Goals

In order to make progress on its significant goals, Ekal Vidyalaya relies on donations, volunteerism and community outreach. The name itself is a direct reference to the impact structure: one-teacher schools are essentially called Ekal Vidyalayas and they are the way that the nonprofit integrates itself into towns and villages in order to raise literacy and improve conditions. Once the school is established and working well, the organization then adds health services and skill development to bring economic opportunities for the villagers.

COVID-19 Considerations

Adapting to the COVID-19 pandemic is a continuous battle for the organization, particularly for its grassroots-based donation effort. Despite this, Ekal has been able to leverage its structure to transition training centers into mask making centers and provide over a reported 2.3 million people with food supplies using volunteers and other community organizations. Early October saw a global Ekal conference wholly online, where goals for the next five years were outlined. Various elements of the organization, from youth divisions to board members, committed to increasing not only education efforts but practical village-to-village communication and economic growth. Bringing together education and Indian children remains a core pillar of the estimated budget, and technological revolutions in the forms of roaming mobile centers and tablets prove Ekal’s commitment to continued adaptability. As challenges present themselves, Ekal Vidyalaya strives to preserve its mission and still improve upon it, which will be a necessary factor for change in the years still to come.

– Alan Mathew
Photo: Flickr

, , , ,

Poverty in Panama Affects Rural Areas and Children

Poverty in Panama
Panama — the narrow bridge of land that connects North and South America. The tropical country is renowned for its natural beauty and diverse plant, animal and birdlife. Yet, all that glitters is not gold. Panama’s economy is highly unequal and there is a wide gap between the wealthy and the impoverished. Poverty in Panama is as much of a prominent feature of the country as its landscape.

Rural Poverty

Ethnicity and geographic location determine one’s poverty level in Panama. Panamanians who live in rural areas do not have adequate access to resources, such as hospitals and schools. This is a result of the lack of infrastructure as well as few professional doctors and teachers or mentors in rural areas.

Panama is the second-worst in income distribution in Latin America, which leads to sector-specific poverty. Unpaved roads in the country make travel especially difficult for farmers. Accordingly, farmers do not end up selling their crops in big cities where they can earn a larger income. Thus begins a chain of poverty in Panama that materializes as poor hygiene and sanitation, child labor, malnutrition, and eventually, another generation living a poor quality of life.

Child Poverty

About 27.7% of Panamanian children live in poverty and 12% experience malnutrition. Failure to register children at birth causes many to go without citizenship. Thus, the government is uncertain of the nation’s exact child population and cannot justly allocate money to the “nonexistent.”

Around 15% of children are victims of early marriages. The legal age to marry in Panama is 16 for boys and 14 for girls. However, most of these children are not registered with the government, so parents marry children off at ages as young as 10, mostly to escape the circumstances of poverty.

The minimum age for working in Panama is 15. Even with this being the case, 5-year-old children often work carrying bricks on construction sites. Several underage workers, or child laborers, even appear in big cities like Panama City and Tocumen. To earn a few dollars more, families force their children to work. However, this comes at the cost of children losing education and facing exploitation.

The Rays of Light

Panama is taking steps to fight poverty. From 2015 to 2017, poverty in Panama declined from 15.4% to 14.1%. In the same time span, extreme poverty decreased from 6.7% to 6.6%. Additionally, multiple NGOs are working to address poverty and other prominent issues in Panama.

The Calicanto Foundation, established in 1994 in Panama, aims to empower Panamanians living in poverty. The organization runs a “personal and professional/vocational training program for women who live in marginalized communities with high levels of poverty.” At the end of the program, participants receive a certificate for employment in the hospitality sector. These skills empower women to achieve economic sufficiency to support their families and break cycles of poverty.

The country, with aid of NGOs and the government, has the potential to bridge the income inequality gap and establish an equitable society for all, regardless of class, region or ethnicity. Panama can be as bright and colorful as its beaches for not only the urbanites but also the rural citizens.

– Riddhi Bhattacharya
Photo: Flickr

,

Kick for Trade: Teaching Life Skills Through Football in Developing Countries

Kick for Trade, Teaching Life Skills with Football in Developing CountriesThe International Trade Center and UEFA Foundation for Children have partnered up to teach children entrepreneurial skills through football in developing countries. This initiative came about through a need for children in poverty to overcome external hiring factors, such as skills mismatch or a lack of financing. Worldwide, 59 million teens and children face unemployment and almost 136 million are employed yet still living in poverty. Football is an ideal conduit to address these issues because it is increasingly recognized as a sport for community development and addressing social issues. This program, Kick for Trade, uses the sport to teach life skills in developing countries, including Angola, Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda.

Kick for Trade

The Kick for Trade curriculum was unveiled in August 2020 at UEFA headquarters to honor International Youth Day. The program had initial pilot projects in Gambia and Guinea in 2019, and after its success, Kick for Trade planned additional projects to take place in Angola, Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda. Unfortunately, COVID-19 derailed Kick for Trade’s plans in these countries. However, countries can expect the program to take off as soon as it is safe to do so.

Once implemented, the program will feature trained life-skills coaches who will teach 11 sessions each on youth employability and entrepreneurship. The goal of the program is to teach skills like leadership and teamwork to children through football in developing countries. Specifically, the life skills of problem-solving, creative thinking, communication, interpersonal skills, empathy and resilience. The lessons require minimal equipment, making the program accessible for any child who would like to learn life skills in order to become more employable.

Kick for Trade’s Projects in Developing Countries

Kick for Trade is expected to teach 1,500 children employment skills throughout the selected countries. UEFA has helped 1 million children worldwide through its various programs since its creation five years ago. These programs span 100 countries, reaching all five continents. The specific Kick for Trade programs in developing countries will highlight different targets depending on the country.

  • Uganda. Kick for Trade chose Uganda for the gender equality project, which uses football in developing countries to reduce women’s poverty and improve education for girls. More than 75% of Uganda’s population is younger than the age of 30 and the youth unemployment rate is 13.3%. This program is an effort to close the gender gap to decrease unemployment levels for youth.
  • Angola. Angola was chosen for UEFA’s project on health improvement and crime prevention for at-risk children. Communicable diseases account for 50% of deaths in Angola. Teaching children proper health techniques is an effort to lower this statistic.
  • Cameroon. The UEFA saw that Cameroon could benefit from its ethnic integration project. This project focuses on using football in rural areas to promote peace. Since 2016, Cameroon has experienced protests and violence as a result of the division between the Anglophones and the Francophones. Encouraging peace between children will hopefully help to end this violence.
  • The DRC. The Democratic Republic of the Congo will be home to Kick for Trade’s project that aids children living on the streets. This project aims to intervene as early as possible to provide homeless children with the assistance they need. In the capital city of Kinshasa, almost 30,000 children younger than 18 are homeless. Law enforcement officials often recruit homeless children to disrupt political protests, increasing the susceptibility of children to injury or death. Adults and older children also often take advantage of these young homeless children. This program works to take vulnerable children off the streets and provide them with a safe place to live, improving their quality of life and future prospects.

These programs will roll out once it becomes safe enough to do so amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Hopefully, these programs will continue to positively benefit children looking for employment in developing countries.

– Rae Brozovich
Photo: Flickr

, , ,

Rise in Teen Pregnancy During Kenya’s Lockdown

rise of teen pregnancy during kenya's lockdownIn Kenya, amid COVID-19-induced lockdowns, the nation is noting a significant rise in teen pregnancies. Over a three-month period of the lockdown, there was a 40% rise in the number of teen pregnancies in Kenya, with 152,000 pregnancies reported. There are a number of reasons why this figure has increased since Kenya went into lockdown, each of which contributes to the rise in teen pregnancy.

One significant cause of the rise in teen pregnancy in Kenya is the lack of access to sexual and reproductive health services during the pandemic. As the country focuses its health care system and medical resources on fighting the coronavirus and caring for the sick, reproductive health services can fall by the wayside. Additionally, historical evidence on epidemics shows that lockdowns and restrictions on movement make it difficult for girls to access the limited medical services that are available.

Impact of COVID-19 Lockdown

Even before the pandemic, Kenya was already struggling with reduced funding for reproductive and sexual health services and sex education in schools. The cultural taboo around talking about sexual health at home leaves Kenyan teenagers reliant on their schools for this knowledge, yet they do not receive the necessary education for pregnancy prevention because the sex education curriculum mainly focuses on HIV prevention and abstinence.

However, Kenyan students do not have access to even this limited sexual health education during lockdowns. Thus, unplanned pregnancy increases drastically as nearly 4,000 school girls have become pregnant during the Kenyan COVID-19 lockdown.

Teen pregnancy in Kenya during the lockdown also disproportionately affects girls who are living in poverty. The lockdown is stressful and even dangerous for those who struggled financially even before work and schools shut down. When they attended school, students living in poverty received free meals and hygiene products. However, students no longer have access to these resources because Kenyan schools are anticipated to remain closed until 2021.

Due to these school closures, the added burden of parents taking care of children who are now confined to their homes worsens the hardships of poverty. Additionally, many parents whose families live in poverty have lost their jobs during the pandemic. Since they no longer earn any income, parents are struggling to afford essential goods. In an effort to assist the family, teen girls may turn to older men for access to food, money and other resources they do not have access to during the pandemic, and in some cases, teens are impregnated by those men.

Lifelong Consequences

Teen girls who become pregnant during the lockdown face a lifetime of difficult consequences. Pregnancy and childbirth-related complications are the number one cause of death globally for 15 to 19-year-old girls, and in Kenya, adolescent girls made up 45% of severe abortion complication cases.

This is especially dangerous given that pregnant mothers already face the threat of coronavirus and a medical system struggling to handle the pandemic. Girls living in poverty or in areas without easy access to medical facilities risk not receiving maternal and newborn health services, putting the health of both mother and baby at risk.

The consequences of teen pregnancy in Kenya continue after childbirth and often affect the trajectory of a young mother’s future. About 98% of pregnant teenagers are not in school and most never return after giving birth. After being forced to drop out of school, teenagers struggle to secure higher-paying jobs, and thus, remain in impoverishment. This perpetuates the cycle of poverty immensely. In addition, taking care of a child requires money, time and resources that are hard to come by for impoverished teenagers. This further contributes to the poverty these girls live in because they often must raise their children without adequate funds, therefore, forcing the family deeper into poverty.

Reform Efforts

Although these statistics may seem dire, organizations in Kenya are working to reduce the rate of teen pregnancy and ensure mothers and babies get proper health care support. The Kenya Association for Maternal and Neonatal Health (KAMANEH) works to promote reproductive health education and provide affordable, accessible health services. These essential services make pregnancy and childbirth much safer for Kenyan women and girls living in poverty.

KAMANEH has partnered with the Medical Link Integrated Health Program, a Kenyan NGO. The partners work to develop reproductive health programs in hospitals and maternity centers in impoverished areas of Nairobi. The organization also runs women’s groups that host training once or twice a year on maternal and reproductive health.

The groups then produce songs and performances about proper health behaviors to educate their communities. KAMANEH works to establish 21 health care facilities throughout impoverished counties in Kenya with high maternal mortality rates. To help improve maternal health care quality, KAMANEH plans to equip these clinics with trained midwives and medical supplies.

COVID-19 lockdowns contribute to the rise in teen pregnancy rates. The structure of the Kenyan health and education systems has worsened the situation substantially. But, with the proper reproductive education and health services, there is still hope for Kenyan teenagers to overcome this issue.

– Allie Beutel
Photo: Flickr