Risk education for children in Laos

By The HALO Trust | 23rd February 2016 |

In 2012, HALO began work to clear unexploded ordnance (UXO) in Eastern Savannakhet Province, Laos. This is the most UXO impacted and impoverished region in the country so we combine our survey and clearance work with risk education in villages and schools.

Children account for a significant proportion of accidents because of their natural curiosity and desire to play, so it is particularly important that they understand what to look for. HALO's trained instructors teach the children safe strategies for farming, vegetation cutting or making fires as these are routine activities for rural children in Laos. The instructors also stress the importance of immediately reporting suspicious items.

The photos below, by Tara Rice, tell the story of Lath Village Primary School.

In addition to suffering from extreme poverty, Lath Village, in Laos' Sepon District, is contaminated with UXO, a terrible legacy of the Vietnam War. Known locally as ‘bombies’, hundreds of thousands of cluster munitions remain littered across Laos, in villages like Lath, forcing locals to live in fear of injury and death and denying safe access to land for farming.

Lath village has only a single one-room primary school for its 31 students. The teacher, Mr. Paiwan, struggles with limited resources but does his best to provide a basic education for his students.

Welcome to Lath Village Primary School, located in Sepon District, Laos

Students from Grades 1 to 5 attend this single-room classroom, the only school in the village.

Lath Village, like so many villages in Laos, was repeatedly bombed during the Vietnam War with many unexploded cluster munitions remaining to this day, causing injury and death and preventing safe farming.

The HALO Trust visited Lath primary school to in November 2015 to conduct Risk Education, which teaches vulnerable young students safe strategies for dealing with UXO

Taught by trained male and female instructors these sessions stress the importance of immediately reporting any items the children might find, in addition to providing safe strategies for farming, vegetation cutting or making fires, routine activities for rural children in Laos. This also provides a safe place for a discussion about the impact UXO has had on their lives.

In this way, with the generous support of US and UK funding, we are able to help keep children like 12-year-old Lob safe.

HALO’s sessions complement the work of Mr. Paiwan, the local teacher, who will use the materials HALO left behind to teach future lessons to his students.

Risk Education is combined with HALO’s clearance and survey operations to provide a holistic solution to the problem of UXO and a safe future for the rural children of Laos.

Donate today help us keep children like Sumai safe from the deadly debris of war.

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To date HALO has provided over 450 risk education sessions reaching over 21,000 villagers in Eastern Savannakhet Province. These sessions help reduce the UXO accident rate in Laos and, when combined with HALO’s survey and clearance operations, are providing a lasting and holistic solution to the problem.