OUR PROGRAMS
Togo is an under developed country in West Africa where more than 60% of rural children cannot afford 3 square meals a day let alone basic education. Of those that go to school, the dropout and failure rate is alarming at 70% due to the lack of proper supervision, tutoring and financial support. As a result close to 85% of job seekers remain without qualifications.
Togo has a young population where 3/4 is under 35. This is supposed to be a force for the future growth of the country provided this young population gets adequate education that can prepare them for the challenges of a changing world. Unfortunately right now this young population is suffering.
The unemployment rate is high at 8.1% between the ages of 15-35 and the underemployment for the same age group is at 20.5%. The poverty rate of 58.7% is alarmingly well under the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of 30.9% by 2015 and the extreme poverty rate is increasing to 30.4%
With such poverty indices, many parents in Togo just cannot afford to send and support their kids through school and many kids end up dropping out of school in order to help support the family. Government bureaucracy, corruption and stringent passing requirements also make it harder for poor students without adequate tutoring to pass to the next grade. The result of this situation is again a high rate of dropout among poor children.