IFAG spends over D1.5M in Gambian education

The Iceland Friendship Association-The Gambia (IFAG), a charitable organization registered in The Gambia in supporting education, child protection, women empowerment and community development, has spent D1,543,779 towards the education of 104 Gambia students.

Speaking at a media briefing held at the Coco Ocean on Thursday, Fabakary Kalleh, coordinator of the project, explained that the support was spent on 104 students from upper basic schools, senior secondary schools, tertiary education (technical and vocational) as well as university.

Mr Kalleh said the project seeks to provide financial and material support to needy children in the North Bank Region to contribute to the attainment of universal access to relevant and quality education.

The specific objective of the project, he went, are to support about 100 needy students with financial aid in their educational pursuit and to contribute towards the improvement of the nutritional standard of needy students as well as to contribute to the universal access to relevant and quality education.

Since the launching of the project last year, D1,543,779.00 has been spent on students, he stated, saying they still have D175,000 to spend before the end of the academic year.

He thanked the board members of the association for visiting The Gambia to see how far they had gone with the project.

Omar Kristmundsson, Chairman Iceland Friendship Association-The Gambia, said they had gone a long way in the cooperation, adding that the visit was to gather information of the association’s operation and how things are going as well as discuss the next steps.

Running a programme like this was in many ways difficult, but it was their conclusion that all the money was delivered to beneficiaries, he said.

They had also visited many of the beneficiaries and were quite impressed, he said, adding that they are looking forward to continuing the programme.

Arndis Jonsdottir, board member of the association, said they need to ensure funds are spent wisely and get good results from investment.

He said it was important for them to see what the programme was delivering as they were looking at it as an investment in human capital.

“We are supporting Gambian businesses because the beneficiaries will grow up to be highly skilled workers,” she said, adding that they hope to continue supporting the programme.

Adama Thorpe, a first-year student of the University of The Gambia, who is a beneficiary to the programme, expressed delight for having benefited from the programme.

Everything has been going on smoothly as regards her payments, she said, adding that the project has transformed her life in a very positive way because she would not have been at the university without the scholarship.