Alagoas, in northwestern Brazil, is one of the states with the lowest human development index in the entire country and where poverty affects more than 95% of its population, according to the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. Being born in one of its favelas is already a life sentence for not being able to get out of extreme poverty. This region contributes to increasing the terrible statistics of global illiteracy given by the United Nations: a fifth of the children in the world are still out of school and 617 million young people lack basic knowledge in arithmetic and a minimum level of literacy.
The good news is that there is a key that opens the door to socioeconomic mobility and, therefore, is the key to getting out of poverty, and that key is education. Or rather, comprehensive education: one that meets all the needs of minors, not only in terms of basic skills and knowledge to function in life, but also the emotional part (focusing on boosting the self-esteem of the girls who, in a situation of poverty are even more vulnerable), social and physical.
Comprehensive education begins with good nutrition, since without health it is impossible to develop as people with a future. An example: Graziela's family livelihood is based on endless days filling buckets with mussels for a very low salary. When she saw that something was wrong and she took her daughter to the Centro de Recuperação e Educação Nutricional (CREN), they told her that the girl was malnourished.
There, throughout the day, the children receive five balanced meals, as well as medical, dental, nutritional, social and psychological treatment. "When I come home, now my daughter tells me with a happy face: 'Mom, I ate real food,'" says Graziela. Once the basic nutritional needs are covered, the project goes on to promote the education and training of minors, so that they can access quality employment in the future.
For seven years, Fundación MAPFRE, through International Social Projects, has helped expand CREN's services, both with contributions of food and by increasing the number of children cared for. “To break the cycle of poverty and violence, we believe that organizations and companies must position themselves by specializing in some humanitarian activity. We focus on comprehensive education through support over time (not one-off grants) with financing, concrete actions and volunteering for social entities, especially local ones, in particularly sensitive places”, explains Fundación MAPFRE.
The one in Brazil is not the only international project that the Foundation supports. In Mexico, it collaborates with La Casa de la Amistad, which provides comprehensive support to 230 children and young people from 0 to 21 years of age who are fighting cancer. “The House supports us with the stay, medication, food, psychological and social support, but also education, essential so that children do not stop studying due to this health problem. They have given us hope to fight against this; it would have been impossible to afford it financially with our resources”, explains a father.
Almost 5,000 kilometers to the south, on the outskirts of Lima, Peru, if we travel to districts like Huachipa, Nievería, Cajamarquilla or Jicamarca, we will only find poverty, respiratory and gastrointestinal diseases, and malnutrition, the result of the subhuman conditions in which the locals. A large number of children under the age of 18 cannot read or write and the school dropout rate reaches 20%. Thus, young people remain in the same spiral of precarious jobs as their parents. The girls will remain relegated to housework.
Fundación MAPFRE and the NGO CESAL have been helping generations of children change the course of their lives for several decades. In this environment, through the Alecrim Child Care Center (CESAL), the institution promotes their educational and social development from pre-school (with educational and nutrition activities); primary (school reinforcement and free time, involving their parents), to adolescents (human, vocational and entrepreneurial training activities). 80% of the young women in a vulnerable situation who have received this training are working or have started their own business.
If we travel to South Asia, in the Philippines, the alarming number of sexual violence against minors is striking, where 60% of cases occur in the home itself. Of the 1.6 million children living on the streets, 600,000 are forced into prostitution. The Philippines has already become the global epicenter of the live broadcast sexual abuse market, according to a UNICEF alert.
The Kalipay Negrense Foundation, on the island of Negros, one of the sources of abuse and poverty in the country, rescues minors from misery, violence and sexual abuse, not only welcoming them and covering their material needs until adulthood , but by offering them a home where they can heal their emotional scars. 102 children can rebuild their lives and have a profession thanks to Kalipay, a word that means “happiness” in the local language, and the work they do with Fundación MAPFRE.
In addition to receiving aid without which they could not carry out their projects, the local entities promoted by Fundación MAPFRE gain prestige that will also attract aid from other organizations. Thanks to these international projects in which the Foundation collaborates, in 2021, 137,354 minors improved their education; 118,433 people received nutritional support; almost 93,000 patients accessed medical treatment; 79,022 participated in access to employment programs and 71,597 women and girls received training in female leadership. "When we see the number of doctors, nurses, lawyers, mechanics, carpenters... born in such poor countries, who have managed to train thanks to the work of these local entities with the help of the Foundation, we are able to affirm that it is possible to dream of a life better”, they conclude from Fundación MAPFRE.
