project: india

Task: Enable child migrant laborers to enroll in and attend school
Partner: Lotus Outreach International
Project schedule: October 2009 — June 2010

Project description:

BGR has made a grant to Lotus Outreach International to enroll school children currently working in the brick kilns of Mewat, Haryana.  These children’s families are landless migrants who have traveled hundreds of miles to find work so that they can support ill and aging loved ones at home.  In addition to being members of the lowest socio-economic castes, as migrants, they are not eligible for government support.  Although parents are eager to send their children to school, they are unable to afford the costs of enrolling their children in school, much less the price of school materials and supplies.  Another disincentive is their fear of discrimination based on their social status.  The result is that children work 14-16 hours a day alongside their parents, often in dangerous conditions.  BGR funds will provide the financial support parents require to enroll their daughters and sons in school, thereby providing these at-risk children a chance to emerge from poverty, to cast off the shackles of social oppression, and stake out for themselves a meaningful and fulfilling life.

Project Impact:

• Provides tuition fees for 100 children for the 2009-2010 school year, at $1 per child, and funds for enrollment kits with the necessary school supplies, at $20 per child.
• Enables families to allow children to attend school rather than working in the brick kilns.
• Affords at-risk children a brighter future through access to education.

Hunger Challenges:

Overview: India is one of the widely touted BRIC countries, four fast-growing developing economies (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) that constitute 40 percent of the world’s population and one-quarter of its land mass.  This economic might, however, is not insurance against hunger and malnutrition.  According to the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization, 21 percent of India’s 1.2 billion people are undernourished, and 46 percent children under 5 are undernourished.  India’s citizens on average earn the equivalent of US$950 per year.  Thirty-four percent live on less than one dollar per day.  The country is susceptible to natural disasters such as flooding and drought, further threatening food supply and employment.

Issues: Contributing factors to India’s widespread hunger are poverty, uneven food distribution, natural disasters, and low education levels.  Almost half the world’s hungry people live in India.  In addition,

• 9 out of 10 pregnant women ages 15-49 suffer from malnutrition and anemia.
• all Indian states have at least a serious level of hunger and high levels of hunger are seen even in states that are performing well economically.
• Over 75% of Indians ages 15-24 are illiterate.

Education correlates with hunger.  Studies have shown that as literacy rates among women of child-bearing years increases, the proportion of malnourished children decreases.

A recent report from the World Bank warns that climate change will have a deleterious effect on India’s agriculture.  In areas prone to drought, farmers’ incomes may plunge by 20 percent.  In those subject to flooding, rice yields may decline by as much as 12 percent.  Over half of India’s citizens depend on agriculture for their livelihood, so not only will these changes affect the availability of food, they will also result in greater poverty.

For an overview of the problem of child hunger in India:  http://www.nytimes.com

our partner

Lotus Outreach International was founded in 1993 by Khyentse Norbu, a renowned teacher known in the Buddhist world as Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche, to provide educational sponsorships for Tibetan refugee families in India.  Today, the organization works in both India and Cambodia to address the physical, educational and environmental needs of children in communities that lie outside the reach of their own government’s educational initiatives.

sources

Lotus Outreach International (www.lotusoutreach.org)
World Food Programme (www.wfp.org)
Reuters AlertNet (www.alertnet.org)
International Food Policy Research Institute (www.ifpri.org)
UN Development Program Human Development Reports (hdrstats.undp.org)
The New York Times (www.nytimes.com)
The World Bank (www.worldbank.org)