Save Our Child

Saturday, October 23, 2010

Afghan Female Literacy Centres bring knowledge and new priorities to remote areas

By Farida Ayari
NILI, Afghanistan, 11 October 2010 – Around 30 girls and women ranging in age between 12 and 70 sit in a small room in Nili, the capital of Afghanistan’s remote Daikundi province. Some have brought their children to the class, where they are learning to read for the first time.

Video: UNICEF reports on Female Literacy Centres that are helping to educate women in remote regions of Afghanistan. Watch in RealPlayer

“Before I had enrolled in this literacy course, I mistakenly strayed in the wrong direction each time I was visiting a hospital,” recalled Razia, 24, who said she couldn’t read the street signs. “A doctor had to show me the correct way. I was so embarrassed of being uneducated,” she added.
Thanks to the Female Literacy Centre, which receives support from UNICEF, Razia can now read – and doesn’t get lost anymore.
Enthusiasm for learning
A little boy observes with curiosity as two older women work at practicing spelling. Nearby, Nouria, a 19-year-old teacher, teaches life skills.

Nouria, 19, is a young teacher at a Female Literacy Centre in Nili, the capital of Afghanistan's remote Daikundi province.

“Our students were registered in their area and they come from far,” said Nouria. Emphasizing her students’ enthusiasm to learn, she added: “These women say that they do not want to remain blind as they were in the past.”
According to the National Risk and Vulnerability Report (2007-2008), the estimated national adult literacy rate is approximately 26 per cent – 12 per cent for women and 39 per cent for men. In rural areas such as Daikundi province, the situation is more acute with an estimated 93 per cent of adults, mostly women, lacking basic reading and writing skills.
This province, with a population of 500,000, is a priority area for UNICEF, where the presence of international and national non-government agencies is scarce. Work toward educating women in remote regions is part of a global push to reach the most vulnerable and ultimately to achieve the United Nations Millennium Development Goals – a set of internationally recognized targets for reducing poverty – by the year 2015.
Influence on families
Almost 125 Female Literacy Centers (FLCs) have been established in Daikundi. Some 3,750 young girls and women are enrolled in these centres, which are supervised by the Department of Education. Around 30 students are enrolled in each nine-month literacy course.

Women, many with their children, attend a class at Female Literacy Centre in Nili, Afghanistan.

In Daikundi province, UNICEF provides learning materials and textbooks to all students and teachers in the FLCs, in addition to supplying classroom material such as black board and floor mats. UNICEF also sponsors and organizes periodic trainings for teachers.
Information from the courses also filters back to the women’s families, infusing new ideas into communities.
“Through my lessons, I teach these women to change their behaviours within their family,” said Nouria. “In the past, they would be beaten by their husbands if they tried to go out, but now the husbands allow them to attend these courses as they learn useful life skills.”
Changing priorities
And the impact on children is palpable, as well.
“When women in the family know how to read and write, children can learn from them,” said Rahima, 23. “Children feel that if my mother does this, it is a good thing and I will do the same.”
Head of the Education Department in Daikundi Abdul Waheed Vasseq said that the FLCs have changed many people’s thinking in this remote area, with more community members valuing prioritizing education.
“Parents who participate in these literacy courses have begun to send their children to school,” he said. “Despite their financial problems, they have understood the importance of education and have decided to work hard to fund their children’s education.”

Rebuilding hope in Afghanistan

Author: UNICEF
Price: Free
No. of pages: 43
Publication date: November 2003
Publisher: UNICEF

In March 2002, more than 3 million children - one third of them girls - flooded the classrooms in Afghanistan. The massive campaign to get schools up and running is documented through photographs and the voices of the Afghan people. A testament to the courage and resilience of the Afghan people, this book shows how education can be the bridge that transforms an emergency situation into one of hope and promise.

Statement attributable to UNICEF Executive Director Ann M. Veneman on the attack on the UN guest house in Kabul

NEW YORK, 28 October 2009 - " UNICEF is outraged at the attack on a UN guesthouse in Kabul which has killed five UN staff and wounded nine others. We are shocked and saddened at the targeting of UN workers who are in Afghanistan to support the Afghan people. We are also gravely concerned about a UNICEF colleague who was in the guesthouse and is unaccounted for at present.
"UNICEF is working in Afghanistan to assist women and children in urgent need of our support especially in health and education. Attacks like this one set our work back and inflict further damage on an already fragile state.
"UNICEF extends its condolences to the families and friends of the victims."

Afghanistan first in world to use new vaccine against polio

UNICEF and polio partners see new tool as a critical step in the face of entrenched challenges to global eradication

Kabul, 15 December 2009 – A new vaccine against polio will be used for the first time today in polio immunization campaigns in Afghanistan. The bivalent oral polio vaccine (bOPV), recommended by the Advisory Committee on Poliomyelitis Eradication, the global technical advisory body of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative as a critical tool to eradicate polio, can provide the optimal concurrent protection needed by young children against both surviving serotypes (types 1 and 3) of the paralysing virus. This will vastly simplify the logistics of vaccination in the conflict-affected parts of this country. This sub-national immunization campaign, from 15-17 December, will deliver bOPV to 2.8 million children under five in the Southern, South-Eastern and Eastern Regions of Afghanistan.
Of the three wild polioviruses (known as types 1, 2 and 3), type 2 has not been seen anywhere in the world since 1999. This achievement led to the development of monovalent vaccines, which provide protection against a single type with greater efficacy than the traditional trivalent vaccine. To determine whether a bivalent vaccine could effectively protect children living in areas where both types circulate, a clinical field trial completed in June 2009 compared bOPV with the existing vaccines. For both types 1 and 3 polio, bOPV was found to be at least 30 per cent more effective than the trivalent vaccine and almost as good as the monovalent vaccines, yet in a package that could deliver both at once.
The bOPV allows countries to simplify vaccine logistics and to optimize protection using a mix of the available polio vaccines according to local needs. In southern Afghanistan, where access to children can be limited depending on the security situation, using bOPV helps maximise the impact of each contact with a child.
Most of Afghanistan is polio-free: 28 out of the 31 children paralysed by polio this year come from 13 highly insecure districts (of 329 districts in the country). In 2009, polio eradication efforts in Afghanistan have focused on improving operations and creating a safe environment for vaccination teams. Nongovernmental agencies have been contracted and local leaders involved to ensure that parties in conflict are approached, safe passage for vaccinators assured and children reached. Due to such preparations and strengthened supervision and staffing, the proportion of the nearly 1.2 million children under five years old in the Southern Region who could not be reached was reduced from more than 20 per cent in early 2009, down to 5 per cent during the July and September 2009 campaigns. The availability of bOPV multiplies the effect of such improvements. However, in the 13 highest-risk districts of Kandahar and Helmand provinces in the Southern Region, the proportion of children who are still unimmunized is well above 20 per cent – and more than 60 per cent in some areas.
Four countries in the world have never stopped polio transmission – Afghanistan, India, Nigeria and Pakistan. Types 1 and 3 polio circulate in limited parts of all these countries, and the others will follow Afghanistan's lead in using bOPV during the coming months, marking the adoption of a major new tool in the international effort to eradicate polio. While the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, a public-private partnership leading the effort, has reduced the incidence of polio by more than 99 per cent (from an estimated 1000 children affected daily in 1988 to 1483 children in all of 2009 to date) polio still has a foothold in the four endemic countries. The consequences are severe beyond those areas: 16 previously polio-free countries are currently suffering outbreaks following importations of the virus; in four of these, polio transmission has lasted more than a year.
The availability of bOPV is part of a range of new and area-specific tactics in 2009 to reach eradication more quickly. The swift production of the vaccine was the result of extraordinary collaboration between the World Health Organization, UNICEF, vaccine manufacturers and regulatory agencies.
The vaccination campaign in Afghanistan is financed by the Government of Canada, the second-highest per capita donor to the Global Polio Eradication Initiative with US$260 million in contributions. Canada, which assumes presidency of the G8 in 2010, first placed polio on the group's agenda when it last held the presidency in 2002. The G8 is the single-largest donor bloc to polio eradication.
The Global Polio Eradication Initiative is spearheaded by the World Health Organization, Rotary International, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and UNICEF.

UNICEF supporting government response to the needs of children affected by floods in central and eastern Afghanistan

KABUL, 2 August 2010 – UNICEF is distributing emergency assistance in the provinces that have been worst affected by recent floods, ensuring that the urgent needs of children are met.
The flooding follows torrential rains that have hit central and eastern parts of Afghanistan in the course of the last week. Afghan officials say the floods are the worst the region has experienced in more than 80 years, and further rain is forecast.
According to estimates by the Afghan Government the floods have left several thousand individuals homeless in northeast Kapisa, central Ghazni, Laghman, Nangarhar, Kunar, Logar, Khost and northern Parwan Provinces where over 4.000 houses have been destroyed. Much of the arable land and crops on which the local population relies have been devastated. The destruction of road and bridges by the heavy rainfall, combined with insecurity have hindered the response. The death toll so far is reported as 80.
As of today UNICEF has provided 430 tents to Nangarhar and Kunar Provinces. Water family kits, water storage items and chlorine for water purification for 2,000 families and high energy biscuits for 10.000 children under five and pregnant and lactating women are expected to reach Kapisa today.
“Children are always the most affected by emergencies. It is critical that they have access to clean water. They must be protected from the threat of diarrhoea and the outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases such as measles,” said UNICEF Country Representative in Afghanistan, Peter Crowley. “But we must not forget that other services such as education are to re-start as soon as possible, to help children regain a sense of normalcy.”
Working with the government of Afghanistan as well as other United Nations agencies and partners, UNICEF is responding to the hygiene, nutrition and primary health needs of up to 4,000 families in central and eastern regions. Oral rehydration salt to prevent diarrhoeal death, chlorine for water purification, high energy biscuits to cover immediate nutritional needs, and equipment for hygiene and water storage had already been prepositioned .earlier this year and are expected to reach the worst affected areas in the next 48 hours. A measles campaign is scheduled for the coming days.
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About UNICEF
UNICEF is on the ground in over 150 countries and territories to help children survive and thrive, from early childhood through adolescence. The world’s largest provider of vaccines for developing countries, UNICEF supports child health and nutrition, good water and sanitation, quality basic education for all boys and girls, and the protection of children from violence, exploitation, and AIDS. UNICEF is funded entirely by the voluntary contributions of individuals, businesses, foundations and governments