Call to focus foreign aid on empowerment of young girls

Ahead of tomorrow’s International Day of the Girl, children’s rights charity Plan International is lobbying the Government to target more of Ireland’s foreign aid budget at empowering young girls.

“In a developing country, girls are the most excluded group of all and by focussing on getting girls into education and offering them an adult life beyond the domestic, they can effect enormous change in their own countries and communities,” said the chief executive of Plan International Ireland David Dalton.

As part of International Day of the Girl, Plan International is organising symbolic ‘takeovers’ by Étáin Sweeney Keogh, aged 18, of leading positions in Dublin.