Nigeria: World Bank approves USD 500 million credit for girl empowerment

The World Bank has approved USD 500 million credit from the International Development Association (IDA) for the 'Adolescent Girls Initiative for Learning and Empowerment' (AGILE) program, to improve secondary education opportunities among girls in some northern states, according to a news report by This Day.

The bank listed the beneficiary states to include: Kano, Kebbi, Kaduna, Katsina, Borno, Plateau, and EkitiIt said in a statement that the project would support access to secondary education and empowerment for adolescent girls in the seven states.

According to the statement titled, 'Nigeria to boost support for keeping adolescent girls in school,' the adolescent girls face many constraints in accessing and completing secondary education.

The bank noted that in northern Nigeria, for instance, the lack of secondary schools was significantly greater with up to 10 primary schools for every secondary school.

"Poor condition of infrastructure and a lack of water sanitation and hygiene (WASH) facilities make it difficult for girls to stay in school.

"In addition, close to 80 percent of poor households are in the North, which makes it very challenging for them to cover the direct and indirect costs of schooling.

"All these factors have contributed towards limiting the number of girls that have access to secondary school. If nothing is done, 1.3 million girls out of the 1.85 million who began primary school in 2017/2018 in the northern states will drop out before reaching the last year of junior secondary school," the statement added.