ASMARA, Eritrea, UNICEF, 30 March 2010 – Delivering education to children in remote rural areas is a major challenge in Eritrea.

In many cases. students have to walk long distances in difficult weather conditions to get to school. And families’ seasonal movements – in search of water and pastureland for their cattle – make it very difficult for pastoralist children to complete a basic education.

Moreover, teachers are often reluctant to work in remote areas, where access to basic social services is limited or non-existent. At the same time, some parents remain unaware of the importance of education for their children – particularly their daughters, who are frequently compelled to marry at a young age.

According to Ministry of Education figures, more than 234,000 Eritrean children aged 7 to 11 are not attending elementary schools. Enrolment in the regions inhabited by nomadic peoples is particularly low, especially among girls.

“By visiting various nomadic schools in northern Sudan and learning from their experiences, we can now confidently start putting our knowledge on different nomadic education initiatives into practice in Eritrea,” said the Minister of Education, H.E. Semere Russom, referring to a UNICEF-supported study tour on nomadic education. The tour took place in one of Eritrea’s neighbouring states, Sudan, earlier this month.

Lessons from Sudan

With similar cultures and traditions, Sudan faces many of the same educational challenges as Eritrea. On the study tour, Eritrean delegates visited five states in northern Sudan – Kassala, Gedarif, Khartoum, White Nile and North Kordofan – observing different initiatives that address access to education for nomadic children In one of the Rashaida nomadic communities in Kassala state, the strong commitment of a community leader successfully influenced the transformation of a mobile classroom into an on-site school. The leader, Mohamed Salih Saleem, advocated education for all and made contributions to start the school – to buy the land, mobilize the community, build huts and provide food and water for teachers.

UNICEF collaborated on the project and provided writing desks and learning materials for the school. As a result of this effort, more than 100 boys and girls from grades one to four now attend the Um Oshoosh School.

‘Education can start in any form’

Various kinds of inventive school structures – including tents, iron frames covered by grass mats or twigs, and mud-brick or cement buildings – also impressed the Eritrean study tour members.

“It was encouraging to learn that we should not worry too much about how nomadic schools should look at the beginning,” said Petros Hailemariam, Director General of the Department of Research and Human Resources Development for the Eritrean Ministry of Education.

“Education can start in any form, depending on local conditions,” he added. “Once the basis is established, it can scale up, reflecting the local needs and realities.”

Translating knowledge into practice

In 2009, the Eritrean education authorities, with support from UNICEF, drafted a policy framework on nomadic education and initiated pilot nomadic education interventions in four regions.

The subsequent study tour to Sudan provided key government officials and partner organizations with the fresh perspectives needed for the ongoing development of a policy and plan of action for Eritrea, which will include expansions of pilot schools and teacher training programmes.

“Flexibility is the key for nomadic education,” said UNICEF Representative in Eritrea Dr. Hamid El-Bashir. “No one size fits all, because all nomadic communities have different social, economic and environment conditions, and their own lifestyles.”

Unicef

UNICEF launched last Thursday an appeal for US$1.2 billion in support for children and women in 28 countries that have been identified critical in the UNICEF Humanitarian Action Report 2010.

According to the report, UNICEF would need $24.8 million for funding programs in Eritrea that help addressing problems of impoverished children throughout 2010.

In comparison, Somalia needs $65.5 million and Ethiopia $68.6 million for the current year.

Critical Issues for Children and Women in Eritrea

Poor and erratic rainfall characterized much of the first half of 2009 in Eritrea, a country located in one of the driest parts of Africa and where seasonal rains are vital for subsistence. The worsening situation has been compounded by the effects of high food prices which have impacted heavily on the coping mechanisms of many households, pushing an increasing number of people into displacements and forcing women and children to live or work on the streets. Malnutrition is on a stark rise as a result, with admissions to therapeutic feeding centres as much as six times higher in 2009 than last year. The presence of landmines in Eritrea remains a major threat, with children comprising around half of the casualties and fatalities caused by the detonation of unexploded ordnance.

Planned Humanitarian Action for 2010 in Eritrea

In addition to working to reduce levels of moderate and severe malnutrition and to meet the needs of over 1 million displaced and relocated persons, host communities and other vulnerable populations, UNICEF is planning to increase its preparedness to provide immediate response to emergencies in partnership with the Government of Eritrea, local administrations and United Nations agencies. UNICEF also leads the Nutrition, Water, Sanitation and Hygiene and Education Clusters, and the Child Protection Sub-Cluster, and participates in the Health and Protection Clusters. Joint United Nations programmes will continue to address the needs of resettlement areas holistically. Following are expected results of UNICEF emergency interventions:

Health and Nutrition: As cluster lead in nutrition, UNICEF will respond to the needs of over 1 million people, especially children and pregnant or lactating women, with therapeutic and supplementary feeding to prevent further deterioration in their already poor nutritional status.

Blanket supplementary feeding, initiated in late 2009, will continue into 2010 in the three most drought-affected regions of Anseba, Gash-Barka and Southern Red Sea as a priority.

Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH): The UNICEF-led WASH Cluster will tackle the problem of access to safe water and sanitation facilities among 80,000 people living in drought-affected areas and displaced resettlement communities by building and rehabilitating water supply systems, as well as providing emergency supplies. The WASH Cluster will also improve the coordination of emergency preparedness in terms of planning and in the pre-positioning of supplies.

Education: A total of 4,100 primary-school-aged children in two of the most affected displaced resettlement areas will have access to a safe, protected and child-friendly learning environment through the construction of classrooms equipped with sanitation, water storage facilities and the provision of learning materials to ensure resumption and continuation of their education.

Child Protection: UNICEF will focus on the needs of at least 2,000 children made vulnerable to exploitation and abuse by food shortages. Support will include the establishment of drop-in centres and several child-friendly facilities that offer psychosocial care, vocational training, family tracing and reunification assistance for separated or unaccompanied children.

Mine Action: UNICEF’s primary concern is for the safety of those currently living in some 480 areas impacted by mines and unexploded ordnance. At least 180,000 students will have access to mine risk education, either in school or via community-based mobile teams. Mine or unexploded ordnance survivors, including children with disabilities, will benefit from increased levels of psychosocial support and vocational training.

EMBEREMI, Eritrea, 31 December 2009 – Encouraging communities to work to improve their health and hygiene means empowering people with the right messages and the means to improve their sanitation systems.

In Eritrea, the remote Emberemi village is located in the midst of a powdery pulp of sand. On a typical homestead there are a few houses, a little kraal with cows tethered to wooden posts, and on the corner is a toilet, also constructed of local shrubs.

Harsh living conditions don’t trouble the villagers, but were noticeable to a visiting team from UNICEF and the Ministry of Health, who arrived to monitor the community-led total sanitation strategy (CLTS).

A project with promise

CLTS is a revolutionary low-cost approach to rural sanitation where communities are facilitated to assess their own sanitation situation, analyze and take action to stop open defecation and build their own latrines without any subsidy and using locally available materials. In 2010, the Ministry of Health, with the support of UNICEF, plans to enable the 60,000 households countrywide to stop open defecation.

According to the latest estimates, only five per cent of Eritrea’s population has access to improved sanitation facilities. The CLTS project bears great promise and could position the country towards achieving the MDG target on sanitation.

Better toilets, better hygiene

The household of villager Amna Abdela Mussa, age 45, was the first to be visited. She paused from her laundry to welcome the team and show them her toilet. “I heard the message from Ministry of Health on the importance of sanitation and I took it upon myself to construct my own toilet,” she said.

The toilet also serves as a bathroom and has two off-site pits. On one side is the toilet and on the other side is the seat for bathing and a pit for dirty water. To ensure good hygiene, a small jerry can is positioned at the door. It is tied to a wooden post, with a rope extending from its mouth to a small peg on the ground. The idea behind this is that one does not have to touch the jerry can, but on stepping on the rope, it automatically tilts the jerry can downwards to enable hand washing. A bar of soap is positioned next to it.

Ms. Mussa is just one of the many Eritreans who have enthusiastically embraced the CLTS. In 2008, one village was declared and certified to be open defecation free (ODF). In 2009, a momentous community mobilization initiative geared towards collective behaviour change to give up open defecation and take up safe hygiene practices took off, with a total of 11,000 households having stopped open defecation and 11 villages now ODF.

Partnerships for shared success

The momentum gained in sanitation has been made possible through funding from the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development. According to UNICEF’s Chief of Water and Sanitation in Eritrea David Proudfoot, this partnership is key and progress depends very much on sustained funding for the project.

“If we are to sustain results and build on the momentum, this funding must continue, it will position Eritrea on the path to achieving the Millennium Development Goal on sanitation,” Mr. Proudfoot said.

It is estimated that approximately 448,000 Eritrean households in rural areas need to build and use their own toilet in order to meet the MDG target by 2015. One of the pioneers of the CLTS, Dr. Kamal Kar believes that this target is very much achievable.

“Eritrea has great potential to serve as an example to the world given the commitment of the government,” Dr. Kar said. Source: ( Unicef)

Unicef

New York, 10. Sep- UNICEF today released new figures that show the rate of deaths of children under five years of age continued to decline in 2008.

The data shows a 28 per cent decline in the under-five mortality rate, from 90 deaths per 1000 live births in 1990, to 65 deaths per 1000 live births in 2008. According to these estimates, the absolute number of child deaths in 2008 declined to an estimated 8.8 million from 12.5 million in 1990, the base line year for the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

“Compared to 1990, 10,000 fewer children are dying every day,” said UNICEF Executive Director Ann M. Veneman. “While progress is being made, it is unacceptable that each year 8.8 million children die before their fifth birthday.”

The new estimates are the result of collection and analysis of a range of data sources by demographers and health experts from UNICEF, the World Health Organization, the World Bank and the United Nations Population Division, guided by technical advisors from a number of major academic institutions.

The data shows global under-five mortality has decreased steadily over the past two decades, and that the rate of the decline in the under-five mortality rates has increased since the 1990s. The average rate of decline from 2000 to 2008 is 2.3 per cent, compared to a 1.4 per cent average decline from 1990 to 2000.

Public health experts attribute the continuing decline to increased use of key health interventions, such as immunizations, including measles vaccinations, the use of insecticide-treated bednets to prevent malaria and Vitamin A supplementation. Where these interventions have increased, positive results have followed.

Progress has been seen in every part of the world, and even in some of the least-developed countries. A key example is Malawi, one of ten high under-five mortality countries that is now on track to meet the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of a two-thirds reduction in under-five mortality between 1990 and 2015.

Estimates show that under-five mortality in Malawi has fallen from 225 deaths per 1000 live births in 1990, to 100 per thousand on 2008. In 2000, only 3 per cent of children under five slept under a mosquito net – a key means of preventing malaria, whereas by 2006 this had risen to 25 per cent. Malawi has focused its limited resources on improvements in health and health systems and the use of the most effective interventions, with the result that significant numbers of children’s lives have been saved.

The new data also shows that seven of the 67 high mortality countries (those with under-five mortality rates of 40 per thousand live births or higher) have consistently achieved annual rates of reduction of under-five mortality of 4.5 per cent or higher. These are Nepal, Bangladesh, Eritrea, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Mongolia, Bolivia and Malawi.

Impressive gains have also been made in countries that are not fully on track to meet the Millennium goal. Niger, Mozambique and Ethiopia have all reduced under-five mortality by more than 100 per 1000 live births since 1990.

While progress has been made in many countries, the global rate of improvement is still insufficient to reach the MDG, and Africa and Asia combined still account for 93 per cent of all under-five deaths that occur each year in the developing world.

“A handful of countries with large populations bear a disproportionate burden of under-five deaths, with forty per cent of the world’s under-five deaths occurring in just three countries: India, Nigeria, and the Democratic Republic of Congo,” said Veneman. “Unless mortality in these countries can be significantly reduced, the MDG targets will not be met.”

In some countries, progress is slow or non-existent. In South Africa the under-five mortality rate has actually gone up since 1990. The health of the child is inextricably linked to the health of the mother and South Africa has the highest number of women living with HIV in the world. Recent commitments by the government to scale up interventions to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS should help improve the situation.

The survey data incorporated in these estimates generally reflects mortality over the preceding 3 to 5 years. This means that major improvements in provision of nets for malaria prevention, of vaccines against meningitis (HiB) and of vitamin A supplementation, improved prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV and of pediatric HIV, and further progress on protecting against measles and tetanus may not yet be fully reflected in the data.

Progress can be accelerated even in the poorest environments, through integrated, evidence-driven, community-based health programs that focus on addressing the major causes of death — pneumonia, diarrhea, newborn disorders, malaria, HIV and under-nutrition.

The two leading causes of under-five mortality are pneumonia and diarrhea. New tools, such as vaccines against pneumococcal pneumonia and rotaviral diarrhea, could provide additional momentum.

“Achieving the Millennium Development Goal target of a two-thirds reduction in under-five mortality by 2015 will require a strong sense of urgency with targeted resources for greater progress,” said Veneman. Source:(Unicef)