In Sub-Saharan Africa, 45 million children dont get to go to school. Thats one half of Africas future trapped behind an insurmountable wall of ignorance, poverty and discrimination.UNICEF SFA International Fundraising Campaign was initiated in partnership with the Nelson Mandela Foundation and the Hamburg Society for the promotion of Democracy and International Law.

Launched in Cape Town on December 6, 2004, Schools for Africa was the brainchild of German shipping magnate Peter Krämer, who has personally donated EUR 3.8 million (around USD 5.0 million) to the campaign. Since then, it has continued to attract contributions totaling many millions of dollars from prominent corporate, state and individual donors. SFA aims to let 4 million of Africa’s most vulnerable children go to school. Working with governments, local authorities and communities initially in six of Africa’s most needy countries, UNICEF is helping to build basic new schools and repair existing ones. Children receive exercise books, pencils and other learning materials, and UNICEF is training thousands of additional teachers. Our focus is on helping the most disadvantaged orphans, children living in extreme poverty, and girls, who are often denied an education for cultural or domestic reasons. Scalability and sustainability are key elements of the campaign. Villagers work alongside UNICEF to build local schools themselves, and then take over responsibility for maintaining and running them. At the same time, UNICEF strives to help national agencies institutionalize and scale-up the Schools for Africa approach and framework, so that local successes can be replicated many times over, across the country. Schools for Africa is making a significant contribution to Nelson Mandelas legacy and vision for the education of Africa’s children and the alleviation of poverty, particularly in rural areas.