Literacy classes help desert nomad women

Self-assured, 25-year-old Aicha Mooha stood up, made her way to the blackboard and added up three numbers in front of the class. The instructor said "well done" as she chalked up the correct answer, prompting a round of applause from the other 20 "students" at this literacy centre for nomad women in the Sahara desert. Sitting on mats covered with blankets in a thatched shelter to provide shade from the burning sun, the women learning to read and write ranged in age from six to over 60. Their families had settled in the small village of of Iguizran Malolan, 45 km from the town of Agadez in central Niger, for the duration of the rainy season. But soon they would be off again with their herds of cows, sheep, goats and camels, scouring the bleak landscape for pasture. "I have learnt how to count, read and write," Mooha said. "After the training, I would like to start my own business - a boutique where I can sell clothes and ladies wear in Agadez," she added. Mooha's story was cut short by the cry of her one-year-old daughter. She was being looked after by Mooha's mother, Fatima, who was also a student in the class. As Fatima handed back her grand-daughter, she remarked that had she known the importance of education 20 years ago, she would have sent Mooha to school. "I did not know the importance of education, but now I know," she said. "I know education is important for women because ladies who have been to school understand life better," Fatima added. She regretted there were no schools in the village when Mooha was growing up, but the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) has helped to change that. UNICEF has helped to launch 2,847 literacy centres for girls and women across Niger. It provides teaching materials and pays the teachers' modest salary of US $21 a month for the first year and half their salary for second year. After that, it is up to the local communities to keep these makeshift schools going with their own money. Literacy centre turns lives around One of the instructors at Iguizran Malolan, 25-year-old Abdulrahaman Ibrahim, said the literacy centre had revolutionised the life of women in the village. "It turns their lives around," he told IRIN. "When they start they know nothing, but after two months, you can see progress because they start to know how to read and how to write and you see there is a complete difference." "At first especially for the older women, it is very difficult but they get used to it and they like it," he said, adding that it "becomes a chance to catch up with a missed opportunity". Ibrahim who wore a white worn out T-shirt, a pair of black trousers and old white sandals, was lucky enough to complete primary school in another nearby village. However, his parents could not afford the fees for him to go on to secondary school. He said young girls were attending the literacy classes in Iguizran Malolan alongside adult women because of a lack of schools nearby. In any case, many of the girls were late starters in education and this made it difficult for them to fit in with classes dominated by younger pupils, he noted "Most of them are over age and cannot fit in easily in the normal schools," Ibrahim said. Semi-nomad families The families in this small village are semi-nomads who move around the region with tents, grazing their flocks for half the year. But they settle in one place during the rainy season between May and October. This provides an opportunity for UNICEF to offer them a four-month literacy programme. The women are taught to read and write in Tamachek, the language of the Tuareg ethnic group which is spread right across the Sahara. But they are also given information about health issues, including nutrition, malaria, child vaccination, breastfeeding, disease control and HIV/AIDS. At the same time, the nomad families are encouraged to plant onions and other vegetables in the oasis during their brief period of settlement for sale as cash crops. In some centres women, UNICEF helps the women to set up "cereal banks," small cooperatives where they can pool their stocks of sorghum and millet. The reading and writing skills and the arithmatic which they learn at the literacy centres help them account for their grain stocks. Three-year programme The complete literacy course is spread over three years, but is implemented in three modules of four month's each. Mooha's class was doing its first year. UNICEF has helped establish development skills and literacy training centres for girls and women all over Niger. However, those in the desert centre and north of the country are unique because of the challenges of running them for nomadic populations. There are only 6,000 primary schools catering for 1.8 million school-aged children in Niger, which is one of the world's poorest countries. But these are not enough to educate its population of 11 million, most of whom are illiterate. 90 percent of women illiterate According to UNICEF, only 36 percent of boys and 26 percent for girls enrol in primary school and 90 percent of all women in Niger are illiterate. Women, it says, suffer the weight of tradition and are generally excluded from decisions affecting their lives. Most are confined to the role of housewife and spend their lives preparing food, fetching water, tilling fields and bringing up children. UNICEF hopes that access to education will give women greater opportunities in life and allow them to manage their own affairs. That in turn should earn them greater respect from their menfolk and help them move towards a situation of equality. "Girls education is high on UNICEF's agenda," UNICEF Representative in Niger Adjibade Aboudou Karimou said. UNICEF helping government establish policy guidelines UNICEF helped to open nearly 1,200 new literacy centres for women in Niger last year. It also produces pamphlets in local languages that are specially designed to be used in adult literacy programmes. Some feature cartoons to educate people about health issues such as HIV/AIDS prevention and immunisations are also produced.