Emergency grants to protect vulnerable children in Iraq and the Philippines
October 25, 2016
The IKEA Foundation has given Save the Children two emergency grants to protect children fleeing fighting in Iraq and severe weather in the Philippines. The grants for €200,000 will help vulnerable children keep up their education in a safe environment.
In the Philippines, hundreds of thousands of people have been affected by Super Typhoon Haima, which hit Luzon Island on 19 October. Winds of up to 315 km per hour flattened homes, damaged schools and made roads impassable.
More than 90,000 people in Luzon were evacuated before the storm struck. School classes were suspended across the region and 92 schools have been used as evacuation centres.
Our grant will help set up temporary classrooms and provide back-to-school kits and teacher learning kits. It will also pay for rapid assessment and response teams to identify and support the worst-affected families.
Education helps children recover
In Iraq, fighting has escalated around the city of Mosul. This leaves 1.5 million people—half of them children—with an impossible decision: stay and risk dying in the fighting, or flee through a deadly obstacle course of snipers and landmines.
With the money from our grant, Save the Children will help children fleeing Mosul to continue their education. It will set up five temporary classrooms and use psychosocial support and creative learning opportunities to help 750 newly-displaced children recover. This is vital to both their safety and emotional well-being.
Jonathan Spampinato, Head of Communications at the IKEA Foundation, said: “All children have the right to safety and a quality education. But when conflicts and disasters force families to leave their homes, children’s lives are disrupted and their safety and education is threatened. By supporting Save the Children’s work in emergencies, we’re protecting children when they’re at their most vulnerable—and helping them create better futures.”
