200,000 AIDS orphans struggle each day to survive. Children are called AIDS orphans if one parent has died from AIDS, as the other parent will, by definition, become ill themselves.
Tanzania is one of the 10 poorest countries in the world as measured by most poverty indices. Most of the wealth is concentrated around Dar es Salaam, the capital, in the SE of the country…the province of Kagera, being in the far North-West, (bordering Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda and Lake Victoria, with Congo close by), is furthest from the source of wealth, so it is one of its poorest regions and the AIDS widows and orphans are the poorest section of this community…. the poorest of the poor.
Subsistence farming is not a good way to survive, especially with climate change and unpredictable rains. Education is the only way to get out of this hand-to-mouth existence. Primary schooling is free in Tanzania, but children cannot enroll unless they have school uniforms, books and pencils. This prices education out for a lot of subsistence farmers’ children and makes it impossible for sick widows’ children, or children in child-headed families.
