Uganda
Children in Uganda
Uganda has a population of over 26.4 million children and unfortunately, 56% of them endure multidimensional poverty and a substandard quality of life. Over half of children under 5 years old and 38% of school-aged children live in impoverished conditions, with limited access to essential rights such as adequate nutrition, healthcare, education, clean water, and protection from violence and exploitation.
More than 8 million children are considered to be vulnerable to harm. Girls are especially at risk of child marriage, teenage pregnancy, and female genital mutilation. Millions of children are working in exploitative conditions in Uganda, with 93 per cent of rural children believed to be engaged in commercial or subsistence agriculture.
1 in 10 children have experienced being asked to do something sexual either in person or online in return for money and/or gifts. Transactional sex is also heavily impacted by the financial situation of the child and their family. For example, some girls exchange sex or sexual favours in order to get rides to school as the journey may be dangerous, others do so to buy food and clothes
It is crucial to recognise that children have inherent rights to protection, education, and the opportunity to create a brighter future.
Our approach: Children at the centre
Children are at the centre of everything we do. We support them to get access to education and other skills development so they can eventually find jobs to earn better incomes to enhance their opportunities to live a decent and dignified life. We build their resilience and facilitate their empowerment. And we help them amplify their voice, opening opportunities to speak up to those with the power to realise systemic change.
Strengthening child protection
We educate parents and communities. We build the capacity of local structures to effectively prevent, detect, report and respond to child exploitation. We collaborate with other actors to influence strengthening of the legal and policy environment for better promotion and protection of children’s rights.
"Violence, exploitation, and abuse in any form pose serious threats to the development and full potential of children. As the future of our societies, children deserve to be nurtured and safeguarded. This is the responsibility of everyone. Only through this combined effort can we effectively combat this destructive vice that jeopardises the future of children in our nation."
Our work in Uganda
In Uganda, Terre des Hommes Netherlands works on preventing child sexual exploitation, child trafficking and unsafe migration,child labour and gender and women empowerment. A lack of and or limited access to educational opportunities coupled with poverty lead to numerous incidences of child exploitation.
Our programmes
Completed
Community Action project (Uganda)
The Community Action project is a twenty one months project implemented in Karamoja region by Terre des Hommes…
Ongoing
She Leads
The She Leads programme fights for the rights, leadership and agency of girls and young women (GYW). It is an…
Completed
Girls Advocacy Alliance
The Girls Advocacy Alliance is committed to fighting violence against girls and young women and increasing the…
Our partners in Uganda
Terre des Hommes Netherlands is part of Joining Forces Alliance: an alliance of the six largest child-focused international NGO: and She Leads, a five-year strategic partnership between the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and four consortium organisations - Terre des Hommes Netherlands, Plan Netherlands, DCI-ECPAT Netherlands and the African Women’s Development and Communication Network (FEMNET).
Our work in Uganda currently is made possible through the generous support of the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
In our work, we closely collaborate with the Government of Uganda, in particular the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development (MGLSD) and other partners:
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