Planète Enfants & Développement delivered birth certificates to 260 students of the public elementary school of Biyéné in Burkina Faso on November 18.
In this village, located in the Central West region of Burkina Faso, the declaration and delivery of birth certificates are rare. We have thus accompanied municipal agents to recover the civil information of the children from their parents, then to obtain from the Court of the Prefecture complete copies of birth certificates, then centralized in the registers or in the town hall. We also conducted an information campaign for parents in the village.
This is a great victory for these 260 "ghost childrenThis project, which had no identity until then, was made possible thanks to the support of the Orange Foundation. In Africa, it is estimated that 94 million children under the age of 5 who are not registered with the Civil Registry (Unicef report 2019).
Not having a birth certificate has serious repercussions on the lives of children and on their future: a child without an identity cannot access his or her fundamental rights. It will be difficult for them to obtain diplomas, to benefit from all health care services such as vaccination, to receive social aid, to vote, to own property, to travel... They will also be at the mercy of all kinds of trafficking. 40% of the African population is not able to prove its identity to date...
"Ensuring legal identity for all by 2030 through birth registration" is part of the Sustainable Development Goals adopted by the members of the UN.
Planète Enfants & Développement is committed to the recognition of this right to identity. It is an essential key to allow children to grow up serenely.
During our visit to the village on December 18, we also handed over 300 solar lamps to the school children to enable them to study at night, as well as 10 hand washing devices.
December 3, 2020
