This year’s focus on the women and girls who live in rural areas has got to be one of the most important areas you have ever focused on. Across the world, millions of women and girls in rural areas provide unpaid care in their homes, nurturing their families, but losing opportunities for their own growth. Only 20 per cent of women in rural areas have access to clean drinking water, against 68 per cent of their urban counterparts. A rural girl is twice as likely to be married as a child compared to her urban counterpart. Like all of us, people in rural areas need both, and they deserve also to live in peace.

Source: The Star March 13, 2018 14:26 UTC