Australia and the Philippines Work Together to Help Street Children

MEDIA RELEASE

Released By:
Downer

I have today signed a Memorandum with the Vice President of the Government of the Philippines for the Philippines-Australia Vulnerable Groups Facility.

Under this Facility, Australia will fund projects totalling $30 million over three years designed to assist villages to meet their basic needs in food, shelter, education and health care, and to enable street children to access food and education services.

As part of this Facility, the Australian Government will provide $9.5 million over three years to assist street and urban working children to obtain rice to feed themselves and their families. The project will also allow poor children to access education materials and school services.

I was pleased to be able to visit one component of the project which employs innovative methods to reach children who do not attend school due to poverty, work or homelessness. The Plaza Independencia Mobile School operates a mobile school from a bus which picks up children who live in the southern Philippines city of Cebu. The bus carries chairs which are set out for literacy and numeracy classes twice per day and lessons are accompanied by a meal and regular health checks.

Australia has also agreed to fund a project of $15.5 million under this Facility which will help over 500 village districts, or barangays, fund local community development. These initiatives include a community foot bridge, a supplementary feeding program for malnourished children, and local micro-enterprises such as stores and restaurants.

The Philippines-Australia Vulnerable Groups Facility will help the Government of the Philippines provide social services, targeted to the poorest and most vulnerable. Urban poverty has been exacerbated by the Asian financial crisis, followed by extreme weather patterns such as El Nino and La Nina.

CEBU, THE PHILIPPINES