(16 March 2017) – The European Commission has today launched its largest ever humanitarian programme for education in emergencies to encourage some 230,000 refugee children to attend school in Turkey.
The €34 million ‘Conditional Cash Transfer for Education’ (CCTE) project will provide bimonthly cash-transfers as of May 2017 to vulnerable refugee families whose children regularly attend school. The project will be implemented in partnership with UNICEF and its partner, the Turkish Red Crescent in support of the Government of Turkey.
The contract with UNICEF comes on top of €517 million already contracted for humanitarian aid and increases the total amount contracted for humanitarian and non-humanitarian actions under the EU Facility for Refugees in Turkey to €1.5 billion. Out of this, €777 million has been disbursed to date.
Turkey is currently host to more than three million refugees, almost half of whom are children. Education for school-age children is a key challenge, with 500,000 children enrolled in formal education across the country (in Turkish schools and Temporary Education Centres), while an estimated 370,000 remain out of school.