Egypt's social solidarity ministry helps over 4.3K homeless children, elderly

CAIRO – 1 January 2024: The Ministry of Social Solidarity released Monday a report on the work achieved by the Rapid Intervention Team, created in 2014, as it dealt with 4,370 homeless cases in 2023, mostly children and elderly.

Most of those were in Alexandria, Giza, Gharbia, and Qena. The services provided included in-kind and financial assistance granted to 526 cases, transfer of 482 children and elderly to facilities, and treatment of 354 at public hospitals.

In a related context, the Ministry of Social Solidarity issued a report in June on the efforts deployed by Egypt to combat child labor by consolidating the social safety network, economically empowering vulnerable groups, and encouraging children to not drop out of schools.

The total number of children belonging to family beneficiaries of the monetary subsidies programme Takaful w Karama is 6,238,190. Fourteen percent of those are aged below six (873,269 children), while the rest are aged between six and 18.

The ministry pays the tuition fees of 480,000 students at pre-university education. That is in addition to supporting community schools in partnership with Misr El Kheir, and whose mission is qualifying students who did not go to school for integration.   

There are also 71 vocational training centers dedicated to teaching those children crafts and professions that would help them land better opportunities in the labor market.

Furthermore, LE140 million have been disbursed as loans to 34,000 mothers of schoolchildren at 10 governorates to start their own businesses and fund their families.