NEW YORK (AlertNet) - The greatest obstacle Niger’s children face in getting an education is not lack of teachers or lack of school fees but lack of water.
As low rainfall has dried up the countryside, the search for water in eastern Niger has become ever more difficult, The New York Times reports. The job of securing water frequently falls to Niger’s children, some as young as 10 or 11. They ride donkeyback as much as five miles out of town, with giant plastic jerrycans, half as high as the children themselves, strapped to the animals’ sides. The more they work, the emptier become the classrooms of eastern Niger.
As drought worsens and more wells dry up, children must go farther and farther to find water, getting to school later and later, according to the report. The greater distances also make the children, particularly girls, more vulnerable to sexual assault.
Eventually, the task becomes so onerous for some that they abandon any attempt to get to school and resign themselves to a life spent searching for water for their families, the report said.
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