31 Jan 2005 14:51:10 GMT
NAIROBI, 31 January (IRIN) - The European Commission (EC) granted the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) €4.5 million (US $5.86 million) on Monday for education projects in Somalia, the agency and the EC said in a joint statement.
"UNICEF will use the funds to promote pupil enrollment and to ensure quality teaching and learning under initiatives spanning a two-year period from 2005," according to the statement.
Part of the money, they said, would be spent on a major education enrolment campaign through UNICEF Somalia's Every Child Counts Initiative.
Community education committees, which manage schools across most of Somalia, will also be targeted under specific interventions to ensure they are better able to manage schools under their supervision, they said.
"Currently," according to the statement, "only about 19.9 percent of Somali children are in school."
According to the 2003-2004 survey of primary schools in Somalia, 285,574 children were enrolled - a 5.7 percent increase from the previous year. Of those enrolled 35 percent are female.
The latest survey says there were 9,088 teachers, of whom 1,210 (13 percent) were female, with an average of one teacher per 31 students. There are 1,172 functioning schools in Somalia.
Somalia has had no functioning central government since 1991 and the task of running schools has mostly fallen on community education committees. UNICEF, in collaboration with local authorities, has trained and supported the committees.
"UNICEF intends to use the EC grant to continue the in-service training of teachers, rehabilitate schools and equip them with adequate water and sanitation facilities," Noel Ihebuzor, UNICEF education officer for Somalia, said.
"Training for local education authorities and ministries is also to be undertaken under this partnership," he added. "UNICEF will also use the funds to create community learning centres, where less privileged Somalis will be able to access primary education."
The new funding is expected to help 80,000 more Somali children go to school. A particular beneficiary group in this partnership project will be girls, who are specifically identified for special support in enrollment, retention and quality learning in primary school.
Most primary schools now use the new lower primary national curriculum developed by UNICEF, UNESCO and other partners.