Nigeria: Airtel and UNICEF will connect 620 primary schools to digital learning by February 2023
December 6th 2022
In 2020, UNICEF launched a global initiative to ensure access for millions of children to quality education via the Internet, while Covid-19 had reduced social interactions. UNICEF relies on telecom operators to guarantee the Internet, which is crucial for the success of the project.
Telecommunications operator Airtel Nigeria and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) announced on Friday, December 2, that they had signed a memorandum of understanding to connect 620 primary schools in Nigeria to digital learning in the three coming months. Called “Reimagine Education”, the initiative aims to provide more than 300,000 school children with the Internet and devices to access a study program for free via dedicated platforms.
The partnership is scheduled to last five years, we learn. During the first year, Airtel and UNICEF will be responsible for providing all the necessary resources for digital learning to the 620 identified schools. The two partners plan to connect twenty schools in Lagos and Kano during the month of December 2022. The remaining 600 schools will be connected before the end of February 2023.
On November 1, 2021, UNICEF and Airtel Africa agreed to collaborate on the “Reimagine Education” project in thirteen telecom operator markets, namely Chad, Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. The African branch of the Indian telecoms group Bharti Airtel had agreed to invest 57 million USD in this initiative.
For Airtel Africa, this new partnership is in line with the “Our Community” pillar of its new sustainable development strategy unveiled in October 2021 and which prioritizes access to education. The telecoms company says “it will stop at nothing to close the huge digital divide that currently exists in the country’s mostly rural primary schools ”. In Nigeria, the free Internet connectivity that Airtel will provide under this project is worth US$1.3 million.
“ With this program and partnership, we are bringing both world-class education and digital inclusion to thousands of underprivileged children and our goal is to connect, empower and transform as many children and young people as possible. Education is power, and connectivity provides the leverage to become unstoppable. At Airtel, we are confident that this investment will not only transform lives, but create a wonderful future for millions of Nigerian children and young people ,” said Surendran Chemmenkotil, Managing Director of Airtel Nigeria.
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