PESHAWAR, Dec 2: The NWFP government in collaboration with the World Food Programme is launching a five-year project - "Promotion of Primary Education for Girls in the NWFP" - in January 2005 at a cost of Rs893.962 million.

The project aims at increasing girls' enrolment in primary education and improving attendance by providing edible oil to 828 schools for girls. Officials said that students and teachers would receive one tin of 3.7 kilograms of edible oil each month during the academic year.

Each girl will have to attend the class for at least 20 days a month to become entitled to a tin of oil. The number of days the school remains closed other than Sundays will be excluded from this number. For teachers, the minimum attendance required will be 22 days in a month, sources said.

To address the low literacy rate with particular emphasis on the girls primary education in the rural areas, the seven most backward districts of the NWFP - Buner, Mansehra, Swat, Kohistan, Dir Upper, Dir Lower and Batagram - have been included in the project.

It would encourage parents to send their daughters to school and help control the drop-out rate. Apart from this, it would also close the massive gap between boys and girls school enrolment, sources said.

The main sponsor of the project, the WFP, would grant Rs893.962 million in the form of edible oil while the government of the NWFP would be responsible for transporting oil from Karachi to the district headquarters.

Sources said that the WFP had been supporting school-feeding programmes for more than 30 years. In 1999, the WFP gave some form of food aid to 11.2 million schoolchildren in 52 countries, over five million of them, nearly 50 per cent, being girls, they said. They said it would assist the government of the NWFP to meet its objectives of promoting primary education for girls in the rural areas.