Thanks to their community's awareness of the Citizen Voice and Action (CVA) approach, Gilbert and Merab* have been saved from child labour and supported to return to school. CVA is a local-level advocacy and social accountability approach that facilitates dialogue between communities and government to improve services (like health care and education) that impact the daily lives of children and their families
*not their real names
In many villages, land restoration and environmental preservation practices are commonly reserved for men. However, this has not stopped 38-year-old Beatrice, a mother of three children, from championing green practices and supporting farmers to adopt them for the past four years.
As we mark this year's International Mother Earth Day on 22 April, Beatrice urges women to get involved in land restoration practices because their efforts are needed and they are equally capable.
Access to water has a huge impact on children’s well-being –particularly on their education. This is because in many families in rural areas, children wake up early in the morning to collect water before they go to school so that their parents have water to use throughout the day.
The reason 11-year-old Clarisse can afford to attend class on time today, is that clean water that is 300 metres from her house. Initially, she used to take a two hour round trip to the water source.
In 2021, World Vision remained faithful to its mission to respond to the needs of the most vulnerable children and communities in Rwanda, and transforming their lives.
Read our annual report to learn about our achievements throughout the year, made possible with your support.
Thanks to World Vision, every 60 seconds a family receives the tools to overcome poverty. Delphine's family is proof.
The 16-year-old has been empowered to become an entrepreneur as a result of her mother’s participation in a pineapple growing cooperative supported and nurtured by World Vision.
Behind every aspect of World Vision's work throughout the last 70 years, Hidden Heroes –ordinary people making extraordinary impact– have risen up in every season. Among them is Rose; a young adult formerly registered under World Vision's child sponsorship programme who is now a youth volunteer on the front line of COVID-19 prevention in Rwanda.
Click below to read her inspiring story!
We have been working in Rwanda since 1994. For the first six years, the key focus of our interventions was relief and rehabilitation for the close to 3 million people that were displaced because of the genocide. In the year 2000, we began long-term, child-focused area development programmes in different parts of the country, targeting vulnerable children and their families with interventions in the areas of education and child sponsorship; health and nutrition; water, sanitation and hygiene; and the economic empowerment of households.
Our more than 300 staff in Rwanda currently work in 23 out of 30 Districts, supporting more than 1.5 million people –especially children–through 26 area development programmes.
See how our programmes are improving the well-being of children, their families and their communities across Rwanda.
Our teams are working hard to make sure every child is not only attending school, but that they have the tools they need to succeed. In 2018, 84,413 students received learning materials (including starter kits and book). Also, some 100 community libraries were stoked with more than 10,000 new books, to help children fall in love with learning.
Access to clean water and proper sanitation facilities are foundational for children to be healthy and enjoy their lives. We are working to make sure there piped water and/or rainwater harvesting systems in all communities so that children and their families can enjoy better health. As access to water and proper sanitation facilities has increased, reports of disease and illness have gone down proportionately.
Our interventions in this sector intentionally target families with very low incomes and/or those whose production is not providing enough food/resources to meet a family's basic needs. We work with families by offering training in modern agricultural methods and new skills (such as breeding animals or sewing). Their new skills are multiplied through access to savings groups and/or microfinance institutions.
Working Together
More than 250,000 children continue to be victims of child labour and sexual abuse in Rwanda. Join us as we work to change this situation.
