Born and raised in a poor village in the Abu Teeg district in the Upper Egyptian governorate of Assiut, Ismail has been living an extremely impoverished life with his parents and seven siblings. Ismail's father is a seasonal farmer whose meager income hardly meets his family's needs. Hence the seven-year-old Ismail had no option but to help his father on the farm for exhausting eight-hour days.
Through the "Combating Exploitative Child Labor in Egypt Project" implemented under the WFP Food for Education program, Ismail has been offered a chance to go to school for the first time in his life. He has joined a one-classroom community school in his district. School meals and family take-home rations are provided by WFP, together with tailored educational and child protection services supervised by UNICEF, and monitoring and referral through ILO, with the aim to keep children in school and out of the exploitative child labor market.
The Project has also secured a micro-credit loan for Ismail's family from a local micro-credit provider to provide alternative livelihood strategies for his family. His parents have regularly attended advocacy activities organized by the project, to raise their awareness on the importance of education and the detriments of child labor.
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