Program Areas
Access to Education
The UN’s Education Index ranks Niger last – 187th of 187 countries.
Niger has one of the fastest growing populations in the world and a landscape that has resulted in significant geographic gaps in school coverage. Over 50% of all Nigerien youth ages 7-16 do not attend school. The reality for RAIN’s target demographics is even more severe – only 15% of rural students attend middle school and with just 9% of girls completing primary school, …
Maoude Increases Representation at Agadez University
Young Nigeriens from rural areas rarely have the opportunity to attend middle school. Almost no one has a local middle schools in their village! Sending your child away to school is expensive and complicated. Parents worry about who will look after their children and how they will be able to eat. Since 2013, the Agadez Learning Center has given rural and nomadic students, ...
Women’s Entrepreneurship
Niger is ranked last of 189 countries in the UN’s Human Development Index and ranks near the bottom of the list for the Gender Inequality Index.
Income loss associated with Niger’s gender gap is estimated to be 32 percent of GDP. We believe that with the right support, women’s enterprises succeed.
Our Women’s Entrepreneurship programs train cohorts of women in the basics of financial literacy and business practice. …
Zeinaba Finds Sisterhood
“I’m an older woman. I have only one daughter. She had two children before marrying… So now I take care of my two grandchildren for her. The children are too young to help me. I was living at the mercy of my own poverty and sometimes received help from do-gooders, giving me a little assistance from time to time. Thanks to two loans this past year, ...
Sustainable Agriculture & Water Management
Land-locked with 80% of the country covered by the Sahara Desert, Niger is one of the most vulnerable countries to the effects of climate change. With temperature increases expected to be 1.5 times higher than the rest of the world, Niger is faced with higher inter-and intra-annual variability in rainfall, resulting in more frequent and extreme droughts and floods. This significantly impacts Niger’s already fragile soil, …
Hariatou’s Garden Supports her Family
Hariatou lives in Tagantassou and is an active gardener through RAIN’s Sustainable Agriculture initiative. As a widow, Hariatou is solely responsible for supporting herself and her children. She is deeply grateful for the opportunity to grow nutritious food for her family and to supplement her income through crop sales.
This year, she grew varied crops including cabbage, lettuce, ...