Benin: Supporting Education of Girls

The project targets girls from poor families in disadvantaged communities of northern Benin and aims to encourage their enrolment at the secondary and higher education levels and to ensure their tuition fees.

Background
Despite progress made in the country's general education system in the past fifteen years, inequalities still exist at all levels in the access rate of girls as compared to boys. At the primary education level, between ages six and fourteen, 45% of girls are enrolled as opposed to 57% of the boys. This disparity between boys and girls is greater in rural areas and at the secondary and higher education levels. Conditions at higher education levels make access particularly difficult for students from poor families.

These inequalities are primarily due to the socio-cultural context which is unfavourable to the education of girls, and are furthermore aggravated by the increasing poverty. Families are often simply financially unable to support children in school. This situation has a direct impact on the availability of qualified workers in the poor rural areas of the country. To make matters worse, management workers from the urban and/or southern areas of the country are unwilling to go and work in the poorer north.

The programme was initiated in an attempt to rectify this situation. It enables girls from 3 communities in northern Benin to access secondary school and helps girls from 5 communities of the same region to access higher education.

Relevance
The programme is consistent with the SDC's strategy and with its policy of promoting gender equality. It is also in line with Benin's national strategy to combat poverty, its national code for individuals and families, as well as its 2005 policy for the education sector, which endorses positive discrimination in favour of girls and disadvantaged groups and regions of Benin.

Goals
The ultimate goal of the programme is to help reduce regional and gender disparities in the training of management-level workers capable of fostering Benin's decentralisation process.

Measures / Strategy
The programme is carried out in partnership with local actors in the field of education. A local NGO, LARES, is piloting and implementing the programme and the following initiatives:

• a social dialogue on issues related to the education of girls conducted with partners such as the local communities, pupils' parents associations, mothers associations, schools and universities, teachers, female pupils and students;
  
  
• political dialogue at the local and national levels on how to improve girls' access rate to schooling, as well as on enhancing educational quality and subject offering;
  
  
• pedagogical support for female pupils and students to increase their general knowledge and to prepare them to make a success of their training. Educational outings, conferences and debates on topical issues and on local development are organised.
  
  
• The girls receive a monthly allowance to cover enrolment and school expenses. Health insurance is also paid for.

Results to date
Ever since the programme was launched in 2000, seen comprehensively, some 3000 girls from rural families have benefited from support at the secondary-school level. The programme has also been expanded to include assistance at pre-school level. Between the years 2005 and 2008, 6 centers were opened for children less than 6 years old. During the same period, out of the 169 female university students who were beneficiaries of the programme, 65 were awarded diplomas, with 29 of them being accepted for a one-year internship in a municipal administration. Financed by the programme, these internships enabled the municipalities concerned to be strengthened with competent and well-trained personnel, thereby simultaneously complying with the programme’s objective of strengthening decentralization and local development.

The pedagogical support provided by LARES has contributed to improving the students' general knowledge, along with their awareness on issues such as the decentralisation process, local development and gender. A dozen of the students proved their worth during internships in local development and decentralisation programmes. Thanks to these internships, the students are better able to perceive the complexity of social, economic and political issues and are better prepared to assist in the decentralisation process and in local development.

Thanks to the programme, more and more local actors (parents, educators and local politicians) recognise that the education of girls is important for local development.