Did You Know?

• Today our world houses 6.47 billion people.
• Almost half of the people in the world live on less than two dollars a day, while over one billion people live on less than one dollar a day.
• Today, over 11 million children under the age of 15 living in sub-Saharan Africa have lost one or both parents because of HIV/AIDS.
• One hundred and fifteen million primary school-age children are out of school, since there are no high schools in their areas. This number equals 18% --or almost one in five-- of the children worldwide in this age group.
• Out of the 550 million working poor in the world, an estimated 330 million, or 60%, are women.
• Recent estimates place the number of illiterate adults at 905 million worldwide. Of this 905 million, 587 million, or 65% are women.
• Every day, more than 16,000 children die from hunger-related causes--one child every five seconds.
• Those living in impoverished developing countries are more than just income poor-their lives, health, lack of education and well being are all negatively impacted by poverty.
• 8.4 million children are enrolled in 20,000 primary schools.
• There are only 6,000 secondary schools.
• Last year 1.8 million children were unable to attend a secondary school.
• Children in rural areas, like Gitare, have fewer opportunities because there are few or no secondary schools.
• Education is imperative in tackling poverty.
• When people have the chance to learn, economies grow faster and  poverty rates decline.

Sources adapted from: The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Washington, DC, Poverty Fact Sheet.  www.usccb.org/.globalpoverty // www.vacatholic.org // www.usccb.org/faithfulscitizenship // www.usccb.org/sdwp