By Aly Ouattara
KORHOGO, Northern Côte d'Ivoire, Oct 10 2007 (IPS)

Nibon Soro and Kartenin Silué, two children living in the Korhogo region of northern Côte d’Ivoire, should be in school. But, farm duties – and their family’s poverty – stand in the way of education.

The two, both under 10, drive the draught animals that help with ploughing. “We really want to go to school, but our father says that he doesn’t have the money to educate us, and there is no-one to help him in the fields either,” they told IPS.

It is estimated that there are about 2,000 of these child cattle herders (generally aged six to 14) in the north of Côte d’Ivoire; but, only 912 are being taught to read and write, according to Rural Development of Korhogo (Animation rurale de Korhogo, ARK), a non-governmental organisation (NGO).

ARK is trying to improve on these figures without taking children out of the fields.

“The empty or rest hours of these cattle herders were chosen by the NGO to start teaching reading and writing in the children’s own areas, and a…park was created where the animals can be gathered while the children learn to read,” Director Benoît Sinan Soro told IPS.

The teaching is done under trees or in village huts with the help of 77 ARK members, and others, throughout the north.

With financial and material support from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), ARK has created community literacy centres in several villages, where learners are grouped.

Those who teach the child cattle herders in these centres only have various levels of secondary schooling – and are trained in educational methods by the Autonomous Literacy Service, set up by government.

Children younger than 14 may ultimately be integrated into the normal education system. Older children have the chance of starting a programme on farm management, which helps in the cultivation of parcels of land allocated to them.

Sinan Soro says that many parents of the child cattle herders, having understood the importance of literacy for their off-spring, are now asking for education to help the children read and write. “However, pockets of resistance remain where parents with one child have difficulty choosing between school and draught agriculture.”

According to literacy advisor Bakary Fofana, the Autonomous Literacy Service uses meetings to promote “literacy in different regions of the country where draught agriculture takes place, given that the rate of illiteracy is 57 percent in Côte d’Ivoire.”

But it was only in 2005 that the national education ministry officially endorsed the project to educate child cattle herders; and ARK remains the only group carrying out this initiative on the ground. The NGO is looking for financial assistance to increase the rate of education in northern Côte d’Ivoire.

“Following work between literacy partners and village management committees in 2006, UNICEF gave its agreement…and the Autonomous Literacy Service was chosen for the publishing of textbooks for teaching reading and writing to child cattle herders,” Fofana told IPS.

The books are sold for about two dollars each, he added.

The start of the 2007/2008 academic year for child cattle herders is scheduled for January, a period after the harvests where there is less agricultural work, and parents receive money for their crops – enabling them to buy textbooks for their children.

“With the support of the WFP (World Food Programme), canteens will be opened” when the new academic year gets underway, said Fofana.

He added that the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation also planned to set up water points to enable farm animals to drink, and to purchase fodder to feed livestock while the children worked their own ground.

These initiatives will prevent animals from wandering off, said Fofana, allowing learners peace of mind while pursuing their studies or cultivating their land.

In the long term, he added, efforts to teach child cattle herders to read and write would extend over the whole country.

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