Unlike many other countries in Africa, there are few organisations working with young people in the Chad, not least because aid programs are regularly suspended with kidnap and death threats to aid workers by bandits who operate in the country.

Life is tough for children in Chad. Most have grown up knowing violence and social instability, four out of five can't read (rising to nearly 90% for girls), those who go to school share their teacher with seventy other pupils, most don't have access to safe water and for the vast majority electricity is unknown (only an estimated 1-1.5% of the country's population has access to electricity).

Children in Chad, in the main, live in abject poverty with Chad considered the seventh poorest country in the world with 80% of its population living below the poverty line.

Those who do work there need your help:

www.soschildrensvillages.org.uk

There are also some other charities who work with communities in Chad:

www.oxfam.org.uk
www.caringforkaela.org
www.saferbirthinchad.org

If you work with children in the Chad tell us about your work here.