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Over 86, 000 children under 15 living in poverty

February 10, 2021 4:07 pm

[File Photo]

Around 86,218 children under the age of 15 live in poverty-stricken households.

This is according to the 2019/2020 Household Income and Expenditure Survey that was released yesterday by the Fiji Bureau of Statistics.

Save the Children Fiji Chief Executive, Shairana Ali, says they are concerned about the recent data.

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“After the impact of COVID-19 we’ve seen that there are more and more households that are not able to support their children’s education because they have become unemployed, they don’t have the means to cater for basic needs.”

She says it is important for children to have access to formal education and they have projects in place to assist these children.

“We do have certain measures to lift children out of poverty, for example, the education assistance initiative that we have had for several years now where we provide assistance directly to families, school backpacks, stationery items etc.”

Ali says the report is quite confronting and households should priorities children’s education even though the cost of living has increased while the minimum wage rate has been the same.